The Swamp and What They Found There
by ChandaK562
Summary: On the day that Shield fell apart, Tony Stark and company were celebrating a joyous event. Now they're hiding in a swamp and finding something the agents have managed to loose. Can the Avengers and Team Coulson work together to save Shield and a critically injured agent?
1. Chapter 1

It had seemed like a good idea at the time. Even sitting in a house, hidden in the middle of a swamp in a borrowed white dress, Betty Ross, no, Betty Ross-Banner now, still thought it had been a good idea. How could she and Bruce know the timing would turn out so wrong? Had it only been a bit over twelve hours since this entire thing started?

Such a simple plan, Bruce had finally proposed after all of the craziness that had been their lives since the gamma rays, and given the situation with her father, eloping seemed the thing to do. So, when Bruce went to talk to Tony, to let him know what they were planning, and Tony volunteered one of his planes for a quick trip to Vegas, it seemed like the perfect solution. Where Tony went, Pepper went, at least for something like this. And then Tony had somehow got hold of Thor, which was fine, and he had shown up accompanied by Jane Foster, her intern Darcy Lewis, and shockingly, Loki's four children, Jormangundr, Fenrir, Hela and Slepnir, and Hela's handmaid, a girl that looked about twelve or thirteen named Leah. So nine people, a giant snake, a wolf and a horse with eight legs had been packed onto a plane and had made the trek to Las Vegas and the first wedding chapel they could find with an opening.

Somehow they weren't the oddest group to ever show up at the wedding chapel, and the ceremony had gone off without a hitch, but they had no more than shared their first kiss as husband and wife than the world fell apart. Shield had been infiltrated by Hydra, and everything went insane. Instead of sharing what Thor said was a proper wedding feast, that sounded a bit frightening, Tony hustled them back onto the plane, and now here they were at some house hidden in the swamp. Tony was in the basement working with Jarvis and Bruce trying to figure out what happened, and where some of their other friends might be, with Thor probably not offering too much help but trying anyway. And she was upstairs with the other ladies, on what was her wedding night.

"Betty, I'm sorry about this." Pepper said as she glared down the stairs. It wasn't Tony's fault. Something serious was going on, and of course he was trying to fix it, but Betty and Bruce had just gotten married. Surely Tony could handle things with Thor's help for a bit, to give the newlyweds time alone. They had barely been able to share a kiss before things went nuts, after all.

"It's fine. It could have been worse. My father could have found out about it, and showed up. Or Glenn Talbott. Shield being infiltrated by Hydra and Helicarriers of Doom nearly getting launched, that's nothing compared to the scene my father would have caused if he knew I was marrying Bruce. I'm sorry I didn't get to throw the bouquet, though." Betty said as she looked at the flowers resting on the coffee table and then to Pepper and Jane. She still wasn't sure who she would have tried to aim for when the time came to throw.

"We have a saying on Asgard about how excitement on your wedding day promises excitement for your whole marriage." Hela had shed her green outer gown and her underdress of yellow wool, leaving her in her sleeveless white shift. She sat curled on one of the couches with Leah beside her, sorting through the contents of one of the bags she had brought from Asgard, spreading out tiny vials and wrapped packages of various leaves, herbs and healing items on the coffee table next to the flowers. "I'm given to understand from my lady grandmother that a bit of excitement makes the marriage bed highly pleasurable."

"If that's true, you're in for a really, really good time if Stark ever lets your husband go." Darcy said just as a howl filled the air.

"That was Fenrir, wasn't it?" Jane asked Hela. Her boyfriend's nephew was actually a giant wolf. She had been kind of surprised to learn that Norse mythology had got the appearance of Loki's kids pretty much correct, except for Hela, who was a pretty girl with golden blonde hair, not some half-dead creature. But all of them were nice, no matter what they looked like, and she was sure she would eventually learn to understand the boys a bit better.

Hela nodded. Jormangundr had been eager to explore the swamp, and Fenrir had gone with him. "Something about a plane." she said after a moment. "I think a plane just landed. Was Mister Stark expecting anyone else?" She knew he had been trying to reach Agents Barton and Romanoff and Captain Rogers. And she really had to find the time to let everyone know the truth about Agent Coulson.

"I don't think so." Pepper said and moved slowly to the door. She should probably go and get Tony but…. "It might be Happy." No one else knew they were there, so she couldn't imagine who it might be if it wasn't him. And if she alerted Tony, he would freak over what was probably nothing, and they would be hustled off to hide in the middle of the Arctic next. Two Asgardians, a wolf, a snake and a horse, also from Asgard. Surely that would be enough to handle this without dragging the guys into it and getting them drug off to the North Pole.

"Looks like you're getting a little more adventure." Darcy pulled out her taser as the group followed Pepper out the door and down a narrow path in the direction the wolf howls had came from. "I hope that Stark has really strong bed frames. You're probably going to need one if that thing about excitement and the marriage bed is true."

Green slitted eyes poked up, just above the waterline, watching the two men who had excited the plane, and then had gone back and dragging things off, and to the edge of the swamp. The snake raised his head slightly as they tumbled the first thing into the swamp. Bodies. They were dumping bodies. His tongue twitched out and he hissed as a second and a third body were tumbled into the water. Not much blood on the first two but he could practically taste the blood on the last body and something else. He ducked his head back under the water and twitched his tail, swimming closer.

The fetid water hitting her face caused Victoria Hand's eyes to twitch open. She didn't know where she was, but there was water everywhere, and she was floating, face down, and sinking. She struggled, trying to will her arms to move, to get her face above the water, but stabbing pains wracked her chest and stomach, and then she felt the water pouring into her nose, and then her mouth as she started to gasp. And there was something there in the water with her, something big with enormous green slitted eyes…. Big, and she couldn't do anything to fight it as it swam closer, and as more water poured in, her chest burning until she involuntarily let out a scream she knew would fill her lungs with water.

But the scream turned into a weak gasp as she suddenly found herself on the surface once more, on her back, something beneath her shoulders holding her up. And then an enormous head broke the surface. A snake? But did snakes get that big?

It was times like this that Jormangundr wished that he could talk, or that more people could understand snake. He could almost taste the fear and despair radiating off of the woman he had pulled above the surface of the water, but there was nothing he could do, but to try to get her to the shore, and get his sister to help, before the blood from the wounds in her back and stomach attracted some of the swamp's more dangerous predators. Fenir paced along the shoreline, looking for a relatively level and safe place where they could pull the woman to safety, howling again, and hoping Hela would come quickly.


	2. Chapter 2

Fenir finally found a relatively level location, and as his older brother pushed from beneath the water, he sunk his teeth unto Victoria's jacket and pulled, until between the two of them they had her back on firm ground once more. Fenrir anxiously sniffed around her. Blood, flowing too fast from the wounds in her back and stomach. He howled once more, both calling for their sister and warning any predators away before dropping to the ground and pressing himself against the injured human's side. Jormangundr added warning hisses as he coiled, half on the shore, half in the water, to provide protection from either animal predators of the humans who had tossed the bodies in.

A snake, a giant wolf. Part of Victoria thought she was dreaming the entire thing, but stabbing pains shot through her chest, making her realize it was all too real. Shot, and she could feel the blood draining from her body. Stupid, stupid, stupid. And if she died here, without anyone knowing, without their knowing that Garrett was on the loose and that Ward was a traitor… But she could barely draw a breath, let alone call for help, even if there was someone in the area who might here her besides Garrett and his flunky. Victoria felt a wave of despair, something that she had never felt before, and she realized she was going to die there, and no one would ever know what happened to her. Ward had even taken her badge, so if her remains were somehow found one day, there would be nothing to identify her.

They couldn't speak, to let the injured woman know that help was on the way. This was one time that the brothers sorely wished for human speech. Fenrir pressed closer, his tongue flicking out, to lap at Victoria's face before he howled again, calling for their sister, uncle, or their uncle's friends to come quickly.

"They found something? Is that what he's saying?" Jane whispered to Hela. She wasn't sure why she was whispering, but as soon as the ladies stepped onto the path, leading into the swamp and the only area suitable for a plane with Sleipnir trailing behind them, they had all automatically dropped their voices, and stepped quietly, trying not to make a sound.

"Someone, in the water." Hela whispered back. But what would a person be doing out here in the middle of nowhere? And then there were the sounds, ahead of them, of people moving through the tangle of the swamp, heading towards the clearing where they assumed a plane might be if one had landed.

"Drugs, maybe?" Pepper whispered. Drugs were the only reason that she could imagine for someone being out here, well drugs or a panicked boyfriend and the world going crazy but how many other people could be in the later situation? Well, how many other people who weren't already here could be in that situation?

"I don't know, but if someone was in that water, they've got to be hurt." Betty said. She didn't have the degree of training Bruce did, but if someone was hurt….

"They're that way." Hela pointed in a direction opposite the noises ahead.

"I'll go with her, if the rest of you can make sure that whoever's up there doesn't double-back." Jane said. Going back for the others, that was probably what they should be doing, but Fenrir's howls were growing more frantic, and she was afraid they didn't have time.

"I got one of Stark's techs to make some modifications to this." Darcy said with a smile as she patted her taser. "Bet it could drop Thor now even with his powers."

Jane didn't want to know. She eased off the path with Betty following behind her, and headed in the direction that Hela had indicated, hoping the only animals they would run across would be from Asgard.

"Is that a dog?" Ward stopped and listened to the howling, that sounded like it was coming from somewhere near where they had disposed of the bodies of Agent Hand and the two guards from the plane. Dumping the bodies in the middle of a swamp had seemed like the perfect solution but hearing that noise…. Do you think there might be hunters out here? That was all they needed, for hunters to stumble on the bodies before the animals and the water could render them unidentifiable, especially the rather distinctive Victoria Hand.

"Poachers, maybe. Or drugs." Garrett said after a moment. "No one who'll report the bodies even if they do stumble on them. Keep moving. You've got an appointment with a girl who really likes flowers to keep."

Copper, Jane caught the coppery scent of blood, and then they broke through the bushes, and almost tripped over Fenrir and the woman he was standing guard by. "Hey, it's just us." she called softly as the wolf jumped to his feet, and Jormangundr poked his head up, hissing menacingly.

Betty dropped to the ground and risked flicking the flashlight she had thought to grab as they hurried out of the house on. Her eyes went wide as she got a good look at the woman, tall with red streaks in her hair. "I know her. Well, I've heard my father and Glen Talbot talk about her. She's Shield. Victoria Hand."

"Shield?" If that lady was Shield, and in the flashlight's glow, Jane could see at least one bullet wound, then that meant that whoever else was out there, and was likely responsible for this, was Hydra. "Fenrir, get back to the house. Get your uncle, Bruce and Tony!"

"Tell Bruce to bring any medical supplies he can find." Betty added. One gunshot to the stomach and from the blood she could see pooling beneath Victoria, at least one more wound to the back. Not good.

"Here." Jane pulled off her robe and handed over, thankful that she had actually decided trekking through a swamp in her nightclothes was a good idea.

"Thanks." The stomach wound was bad, but it looked like she was losing more blood from whatever was wrong with her back. "Agent Hand, ma'am?" Betty called as she motioned for Jane to help her roll the injured woman onto her side. "Can you hear us? My name's Betty Ross, well, Ross-Banner now. I think you've met my father before, but please don't hold him against me. My friend's Jane Foster. We're going to try to get some pressure on these wounds, alright, to slow the bleeding down." Two gunshots almost on top of each other in her right upper back. Hopefully the wrong angle to have caused spinal damage, though. "My husband's going to be here in a minute. He's a doctor. He'll get you fixed up and to the hospital. You're going to be fine."

She couldn't open her eyes now, she could barely breathe, but Victoria heard someone saying her name, and her fingers twitched weakly in reaction. Someone there knew who she was. And if they did, there was a chance they might know to contact Shield and let them know what had happened to her. She felt herself starting to drift away. Too late, but maybe not too late to save the rest of Shield if they could be warned in time.


	3. Chapter 3

"Two of them." Pepper said as the four women, well three women and a girl, and the giant horse finally spotted people moving through the swamp, heading towards the only clear area that would allow a plane to land. She paused, not sure if they ought to continue, to try to find out who they were, or to go back and help Betty and Jane with whoever was in the swamp, and likely injured.

Before she could decide, one of the figures stopped and turned his head, looking in the direction of the water. "Do you hear something?" Ward cocked his head and strained his ears, trying to listen. Howls, and some sort of hissing, but was that a faint voice he heard? Poachers or drug runners, John was probably right, but what if it was some sort of scientist studying the swamp, someone who would call in finding three dead bodies? If the authorities were called in, Agent Hand would be almost instantly identified, even without her badge. And if she was identified, any advantage they might have would be lost. "We need to go back and make sure those bodies sank." They probably should have weighted them down just be be sure.

They had just turned, and hadn't taken more than a few steps when something shot out of the bushes, and before John could move, prongs were sinking into his arm, even through the protection of his clothes, and the next thing he knew he was falling on his back, shaking as what felt like a million volts of electricity shot through him.

"Stay right where you are." Pepper ordered as they stepped out of the bushes, Darcy holding her taser and keeping the voltage running to incapacitate the man she had hit.

Was that Tony Stark's girlfriend? Ward thought he could place the red-headed woman, but the other three were strangers. He held his hands up, trying to look non-threatening. Three women and a kid, he could talk his way out of this, no problem. "Ladies, I'm sorry if we scared you, but we're from Shield on an important mission, so…."

"No you're not." Hela looked beyond Ward, in the direction of the water, listening for a moment. "He's something called the Clairvoyant. You were taking him to lock-up but you turned and shot three people, and then disposed of their bodies in the swamp." As she talked, she moved, positioning herself in front of Pepper and Darcy. "You're a traitor and a liar."

How did she know that? "Ma'am, I don't know where you got that idea but…."

'Grant Ward, traitor to Shield." Hela continued as she identified the face. "Lady Sif told us about you when she returned Lorelei to prison."

Asgardian? She was an Asgardian? But Asgardian or not, she looked like a fairy princess in a white gown. He could handle this. It looked like Garrett was trying to get the taser prongs loose. He could handle this. "Who are you?"

"Hela, princess of Asgard, queen of Helheim and Neifheim. I believe you might have heard of my father, Loki? He allowed aliens to invade your planet two years ago."

Loki's daughter. The daughter of the king of lies. Ward realized in an instant that he wasn't going to be able to fool this girl, and his hand was moving, going for his gun.

"How did you get into Shield?" Darcy asked as the gun was jerked away, and then went flying with a flick of Hela's hand. "A gun against an Asgardian? An Asgardian's who's Loki's kid? Was everyone at Shield taking a nap today? Because if the average Hydra thug is as dumb as this one, that's the only way I can see that they pulled what they did." She shook her head as images of Hydra goons creeping past Agents cuddled up with blankets and teddy bears danced in her head.

Okay, weapons were out, but still, he was a specialist. He could handle this. Maybe not the Asgardian, but one of the others. Ward lunged towards Pepper, who he assumed was the most vulnerable, only to bounce away and skid back several feet before landing on his back in the mud.

"Force field?" Pepper asked.

"My uncle borrowed my brothers and I frequently when we were children, and he was young and foolish. For some reason he thought that being seen with young children would help attract the attention of young ladies of dubious virtue in every tavern in the Nine Realms. I could make a force field by the time I was five. Mjolnir bounced off of it once." Keep these two here for just a bit longer. Hela couldn't physically fight them like her uncle or Lady Sif, but she had learned well from her father the potency of words as weapons. Do whatever she had to do to keep them from finding out that one of their victims was still alive.

"Pepper?" Tony called as he came up the steps, with Bruce and Thor behind him. The house was quiet, too quiet and panic washed over him when he didn't see Pepper immediately waiting and demanding to know what was going on. His eyes darted around the room frantically. She wasn't there. None of the ladies were there. They had been there. He could see one of Hela's bags emptied on the table but they were gone. Something had happened and….

A noise at the door snapped him out of his panic and as he turned to look, Fenrir was somehow pawing the door open and rushing in, yipping and howling.

"Where…" Thor started to speak but then stopped and listened to what his nephew was saying. "Fenrir and Jormangundr found something, people tossing bodies into the swamp. One of them was still alive, an agent of Shield. Jane and your Betty are tending her. They said to come quickly with whatever you need to help." He told Bruce.

"Shield?" If an Shield agent was out there and injured, that meant that Hydra was out there, which didn't make Tony feel better.

"Injured? How bad?" Bruce asked. Injuries, not good. Bandages, blankets but anything that needed more than that, and they were in trouble. This wasn't the most well stocked of Tony's properties, at least when it came to anything medical. Apparently getting his heart fixed had made him a bit careless in that respect.

"Gunshots to the stomach and back." Thor shoved Hela's things in her bag and tossed it to his nephew before opening his hand and summoning Mjolnir.

Gunshot wounds, not good. Bandages and blankets weren't going to do much to help that, but Bruce grabbed them anyway, hurrying out after Thor and the panicking Tony, feeling his green alter-ego in his mind, shouting to be allowed out. If anything happened to Betty….

Someone else was coming. Ward's head jerked up as he heard more footsteps, footsteps that could only lead to disaster if they belonged to who he feared they did. They had to end this now. Force field or not, these were just women. He could handle them. He lunged forward, towards the little girl this time, as he spotted Garrett moving, and jerking the taser prongs out of his arm, going for the girl who had shot him.

Before he could even hit the forcefield, someone grabbed him, and his neck was on fire, dropping him back, and Garrett was flying as something huge smashed into him.

"Pepper!" Tony shouted her name as they raced forward. If anything happened, and stupid, stupid, stupid, why hadn't he called his armor?

"We're fine!" Pepper shouted as she willed the Extremis back and looked down at Ward, who was clutching the handprint burned into his neck and moaning. She hadn't meant to do that much damage, but still it would hopefully be enough to keep him down, especially if Sleipnir had taken out the other Hydra agent with a kick. "Tony, this way! Is Bruce with you?"

They reached the water where Jane and Betty were kneeling by Victoria, trying to stem the flow of blood from her back at the same time. "She is Shield." Tony said as he caught a glimpse of the woman in the glow from the flashlight. "I recognize her."

'Betty, let me." Bruce said as he knelt down, and moved the robe that they were using to apply pressure. "Can someone get some more light?" He already had a bad feeling, though, that these wounds were beyond his ability to fix.

"Here." Hela took her bag from Fenrir and reached in, taking out a ball and tossing it up into the air, where it started to glow.

"Better." But seeing the wounds, two in the back that had to have hit the lung and caused catastrophic damage…. "Ma'am?" he called as he took the flashlight from Betty and gently pushed Victoria's eyelids back to check her pupils. Starting to dilate and there was a bluish tinge to her lips. Not good. "Ma'am, my name's Doctor Banner. My friends and I are going to help you, alright?" If she was Shield, she probably knew he was the Hulk, but hopefully she wouldn't hold that against him. He got one of the blankets folded and wrapped around her stomach as a makeshift dressing as he spoke and then secured the robe that Betty and Jane had been using with another blanket, but this woman needed a trauma center and a surgeon, not extremely basic first aid. Labored breathing, one side of her chest barely moving at all, and when he pressed his fingers to her throat, her pulse was barely detectable. That bad in the middle of a swamp, he wasn't sure she would even make it to a hospital.


	4. Chapter 4

Hela searched her bag again, after a moment her fingers brushing a familiar bottle. "Here, this might help." She said as she dropped to the ground on Victoria's other side, a small blue bottle, almost glowing, in her hand. "Ma'am, try to swallow, alright? Just a few drops." she called softly as she uncapped the bottle and pressed it to Victoria's lips, letting a tiny bit of the liquid trickle into her mouth.

"What is that?" Did the Asgardians have something for healing?

"Strengthening potion. Healing spells and elixirs are tricky at best, and without more experience with mortals it's too risky. A strengthening potion, though, it might buy some time." Her fingers gently stroked, sparkles of blue light dancing, and speeding up the work of the potion, the red streaks in Victoria's hair fading and her hair lightening all together.

It tingled, whatever had slipped down her throat tingled, but Victoria suddenly found the strength to open her eyes. Anything more than a few inches from her face was a blur, her glasses streaked with swamp water and the frame bent, and she couldn't draw a decent breath, but there were people with her. People who knew who she was. Maybe there was a chance, if for nothing else to to warn Coulson and the other agents before it was too late.

"Whatever that stuff is, it's working." Bruce said. It wasn't much, but the pulse he had barely been able to find a moment before was coming back. It wasn't much, still a weak flutter, but hopefully enough for them to get her to the hospital. How to get her to the hospital, though, that was going to be tricky. Tony or Thor flying her, he wasn't sure if that was the best plan, given how bad this was.

"I can get us there, if you can show me where to go." Hela said. "Papa gave me something, to open his secret ways between the realms."

"Okay." Bruce wasn't sure what she was talking about, but he was going to go with it. If she had some way to move them fast, this lady might have a shot. "Tony, we need to get her to a level one trauma center. Can you find the closest one?"

"Trauma…. Here." He hadn't thought to summon his armor but he still had tablet in hand, and maybe that was the better option. He pulled up something and then held the resulting hospital website complete with map out to Hela.

"That's good. We talked to a doctor there when we were trying to find someone to do Tony's surgery. They're good." Pepper said as she looked at the tablet.

"Level one trauma?" Bruce watched as Thor lifted the injured agent as carefully as possible, a third blanket tucked around her, and adjusted her a bit, so her head was supported against his shoulder.

"Right. Best around according to whoever does their PR."

"Sleipnir, Jor, the two of you wait here. Watch those two villains." Hela ordered her oldest and baby brothers. Fenrir could pass for a Midgardian dog if he shrank a bit but her other brothers would send humans screaming. She stood, and touched the crystal of her necklace, a pulsing blue light jumping from her fingertips to the stone and then out, washing over the group as they vanished through the newly opened pathway.

"We can't tell anyone who she is." Tony said as they appeared, just outside the doors to the emergency room, where luckily there were no ambulances waiting, or people to spot them. With the chaos at Shield and the Hydra situation, and he recognized the agent in question. Victoria Hand was pretty high ranking. If anyone knew she was helpless in a hospital, he wouldn't be surprised if either the government didn't go after her for Shield info or Hydra didn't make another attempt to kill her.

"We found her on a walk." Walking in the middle of a swamp sounded crazy, but they were with Tony Stark. People expected crazy from him. "Hey!" Bruce shouted as they came through the doors. "We need help now!"

A nurse looked up, her eyes going wide at the sight of the group pushing through the doors. Was that Tony Stark? But then she caught sight of the woman the large man was carrying, blood soaking through makeshift dressings, and she jumped to her feet, hitting a button that had more help appearing in moments.

"Here. What happened?" a doctor said as he motioned for them to get Victoria onto the stretcher an intern shoved in.

"We don't know." Tony said. "We were taking a walk and we found her, on the edge of the water out near my new place. Bruce here's a doctor. He bandaged her up and we got her here as fast as we could."

"Three gunshots, two to the back, one to the abdomen." Bruce added. "Extremely labored breathing, the right side of her chest is barely moving at all."

"Ma'am, can you hear me?" The doctor called as he pressed his stethoscope to Victoria's chest. The woman's eyes were open but unfocused. No breath sounds on the right side and there was tracheal deviation to the left. She had to have a massive hemothorax going on. "Page Peters and Wilcox down here now!" he ordered the nurse at they started to hustle the stretcher towards a trauma room. "And tell them to get a OR prepped! Anyone who isn't critical, bounce them if they have to! And tell the bloodbank I need four units of O negative blood up here yesterday and activate the massive transfusion protocols!"

"Can you go to the waiting room? Someone will be with you shortly." The nurse said, waving with one hand as she hit buttons on the phone to activate the necessary personnel. "The police will want to talk to you."

"What they're doing, it sounds like they know what they're doing, right?" Tony demanded as soon as the group was off in a corner of the waiting room, with Hela casiting silencing and notice me not spells to give them privacy.

"They're moving fast. Get a chest tube in, get transfusions started, get her up to surgery, she's got a chance." Bruce said after a moment.

"Would it help if we could watch?" Hela asked. "Hildy found a spell in one of my books that allows for limited observation."

"A spying spell?" Thor said.

"With her brothers, the child needs it." Hela replied. "And it's limited in the distance it can reach, but I'll try if it might help."

"Try it." Bruce said, and Hela waved her hands, chanting softly as the air shimmered in front of her, before an image appeared.

"Ma'am?" the doctor or who Victoria assumed was a doctor from the way he was talking, called to her. He was just a blurry figure to her as people moved around her, cutting her clothes away, removing her glasses which limited her vision more, and attaching wires and tubes everywhere. "Ma'am, we're going to help you. Just stay awake, alright? Let's get a chest x-ray to confirm before I get a tube in." The doctor said before turning to the intern who was drawing blood. "I need a type and cross and coag profile as fast as the lab can get it!"

What he expected was on the x-ray, two bullets still in the lung, and a right lung almost filled with blood, leaving barely any space for air to move. "Ma'am, this might hurt a bit." He injected an anesthetic into Victoria's side, but he with how bad the damage was, he didn't have the time to make sure it had taken effect completely before making a cut into her right chest wall, and pushing the chest tube into place.

"What happened?" Doctor Wilcox called as she hurried in. "I didn't hear an ambulance calling a trauma like this in." Blood was pouring from the chest tube, not good.

"A group of people brought her in. They said they found her out in the swamp. I swear one of them was Tony Stark." the first doctor, Doctor Martin said as he worked, securing the tube and making sure it was hooked up to the drains before placing a second to hopefully clear the blood faster and get some space for air in her lung again. Her O2 readings were lousy, hovering in the 80s, and her blood pressure was in the extreme danger zone, 50/30 and dropping. "Does someone have that blood?"

"Got it." A nurse called as she hurried in and got the blood hooked into place to be rapidly infused. "They're getting plasma and typed blood ready. The OR's on standby." Doctor Peters, the thoratic surgeon came hurrying in behind her, and after a moment to study the scene, turned to the x-rays, trying to figure out the best approach if they could get this woman to the operating room.

"She's bleeding into her belly." Doctor Wilcox called as she gently examined the abdominal wound. "How much blood has she lost?" A lung nearly completely filled, couldn't that hold nearly 40 percent blood volume, and add the bloodless into the abdomen and then external bleeding, this woman had to have lost at least 60 percent. But her eyes were still open, and it looked like her vision was tracking people moving around the room. That was the only positive sign she could see. "Do we have a name for her?" It probably didn't matter to them, but she always liked to have a name for her patients.

"No ID, the people who brought her in said they didn't have a clue. The police are on their way. Hopefully they can get an ID for us." Blood pressure was edging up a bit, 55 over 30. Not stable and he normally wouldn't move someone with a pressure less than 60, but he had the feeling this lady didn't have that time. "Let's get her to the OR now!"

"Ma'am, we're taking you to surgery now. Just stay with us a little longer." Victoria heard one of the doctors say as she felt herself moving. She struggled to comply even as she felt her mind drifting away. A message. She had tried her best to leave a message. Had the people who had found her understood? Even if it was too late for her, the rest of Shield had to know what happened.

"Surgery. They're getting her to surgery. That's good, right?" Tony asked as the image faded. And he had recognized one of the doctors, Peters he thought the name was. He was good. Good doctors and they could fix this, right?

"I'd like it if her blood pressure had been up a little more, but she was still awake. That's a point in her favor." Bruce said after a moment.

"We need to call someone. Tony, do you know how to get ahold of anyone trustworthy? What about Natasha or Clint? Or Steve?"

"I've been trying to get them since this happened no luck." Tony said.

"Coulson." Hela said, her voice soft and her eyes suddenly focused on something beyond all of them. "No." She called firmly. "You've done your duty. Let the doctors do theirs now. There's nothing you can do for her but endanger her."

"What…" Betty started to say.

"She sees dead people." Darcy blurted. "It made our tour of the Tower of London really interesting."

"Dead people? And you couldn't have mentioned this while we were in Vegas?" Tony said.

"Tony." Pepper hissed. Dead people, that explained what Hela had been saying back in the swamp. "The other bodies from the plane?"

"Guards from the Hub. Agent Hand managed to hold it for Shield." Hela said after listening for a moment. "The other man's John Garrett. A Hydra agent they were transporting to the Fridge. Ward was his protege. He asked to come along, and then shot them, and took over the plane."

"Do they know anyone we can contact to let them know what happened?" Pepper asked as the name Hela had mentioned suddenly hit her. "Wait did you say…."

"Agent Coulson was at the Hub. He might still be there." Hela replied.

"I sent two hundred dollars in flowers to his funeral. He isn't dead?" Tony said.

"My Lady Sif saw him not more than a few weeks ago when she came in search of Lorelei." Hela said. "Papa says he's a very bad influence."

"Loki." Hela had been talking about her father in the present tense the entire time she had been on Midgard. Why hadn't he picked that up before? His brother had managed to fool him again. "And is there anyone else who's death might be in error that we should know about?" Thor asked his niece.

"Grandmother, although to be fair, I didn't know she and grandfather hadn't visited and informed you of what happened until I arrived on Midgard myself. Grandmother said they were going to tell you. She said she wanted to see England at a time when their capitol wasn't on fire and bridges weren't falling down. But apparently Grandfather's new fascination with Mai Tais and parasailing distracted them a bit. And…. Look." Hela's eyes went wide and she pointed at her uncle, and the front of his shirt, stained with blood, blood that formed numbers and letters.

"She wrote a phone number." Tony said. Not able to speak, Victoria had written what could have been a final message in her own blood. "Let's just hope it's Coulson's." He pulled out his phone and crossed his fingers as he dialed. He would even forgive Agent those expensive flowers if he would just answer the phone now.


	5. Chapter 5

The phone Victoria had given him was ringing, and Coulson had a bad feeling as he pulled it out. They couldn't have reached the Fridge already, and he didn't know of another reason besides trouble that would lead Victoria to call him. Trouble, exactly what his people didn't need at the moment. But he had to answer. "Hello."

"Agent! It is you!" Stark couldn't keep some of the happiness out of his voice, even though he was calling to tell Coulson that two of his people were dead, and one of his co-workers was fighting for her life in surgery. "Did you get the flowers I sent? If I had known you were alive, I would have out a different message on them, you know that, right?"

"Stark?" Tony Stark. It hadn't been nearly long enough for him to forget that voice. "How did you get this number?"

"Tony, no joking around." Pepper ordered him. "We've got serious problems."

"Extremely serious." Hela said as she and Fenrir looked up. Jor and Sleipnir searched the swamp, and found no sign of those two Hydra villains."

"They got away?" Darcy said. "How did they get away after Pepper practically set one on fire and the other was tased and kicked by super-horse?"

"Sleipnir kicked one of them and he walked away?" Thor said. They had a serious problem indeed if that was so. He couldn't imagine anyone of Midgard who could take one of his nephew's kicks without suffering severe damage.

"Stark? I asked how you got this number? Have you been hacking Shield?" Coulson demanded. Please let Stark have hacked Shield instead of the horrible feeling that was growing stronger being correct.

"Yeah, okay, time to be serious. We've got a problem, Agent." Stark said. "When the entire thing happened with Shield, I got Pepper, Bruce, Betty, Thor and company hustled off to what I thought would be a safe location. Only it turns out that Hydra picked it as a safe location to dump bodies. We found three of your agents in the swamp. Two of them are dead, the third's in the hospital in emergency surgery right now. That's where I got this number. She managed to write it in her own blood."

"Victoria." And the horrible feeling he had was real, and about to get worse, he felt sure. Without thinking, he waved for May to join him. Finding out she was spying on him for Fury, that she had known what had happened when he was brought back and hadn't told him even as he grew more and more frantic to know the truth had shattered his trust in her, but now he sensed disaster and he knew he needed her help to get the team through this.

"What's wrong?" May asked as she hurried over and let Phil tug her into the closest room with a door he could lock. "Phil?" She had never seen him that pale before and suddenly she was afraid the director's concerns about him might be about to come to pass.

"The plane taking Garett to the Fridge, the guards are dead. Victoria's in emergency surgery." Coulson quickly explained as he switched the phone to speaker. Better for them both to hear it at once. "Who shot them?" But did he really have to ask? He somehow knew.

"Grant Ward." Stark said.

He had known it, since Stark said that the guards were dead and Victoria was in surgery, but Coulson winced anyway. Hydra had shaken their team, but this would shatter them. "Do you have him and Garrett?"

"We thought we did, but somehow they managed to get away." Stark told him.

"Which is really, really weird." Darcy added as she leaned over and pushed a bit so she could speak into the phone. "Because Garrett, I hit him with my taser and I just got this thing powered up, so he ought to have been down for the count. And Super-Horse kicked him, and he has eight legs so he can really kick. He should be in pieces or possibly in traction right now, not running loose. And you owe me an Ipod."

Ward a traitor and on the run with Garrett, not good. "The Fridge." He said after a moment's thought. "They're heading for the Fridge." That might have been the plan all along, when Garrett made his slip. Maybe he did it on purpose, to get taken to the one location housing their most dangerous prisoners and weapons. If they got in there….

"Fridge. That explains the letters." Stark said as he looked at the three letters written in blood, FRI. Bleeding to death and Agent Hand was still trying to do her job? That had to be a good sign, didn't it?

"Where is this Fridge?" Thor asked. "I would happily go there and assist in its defense."

"Coulson, Thor's offering to head to the Fridge if you think that's where these people are heading. Good idea or not?" Stark asked.

Thor. That might be the best idea Tony Stark had ever came up with, send someone who was from another planet and who couldn't possibly be Hydra, to back their people up. "Get him there fast." But would one Asgardian be enough?

"My lady grandmother would be happy to assist as well. And possibly grandfather, if it doesn't interfere with his snorkeling lessons." Hela said, sensing what Coulson was thinking.

Coulson didn't even want to know what that meant. He just hoped that it was a sign they were going to be able to save something.

"Mister Stark, this is Agent May." she said. "How bad is Victoria?"

"Critical. Let me put Bruce on, okay? He can probably explain it better." Tony said as he handed over the phone.

"Agent Coulson, Agent May, right?" Bruce said.

"Right. How bad is she?" May asked again.

"Three gunshot wounds, one to the abdomen, two to the back. Massive hemothorax in the right lung, bleeding into the abdomen." Bruce told them. "Probably at least sixty percent blood loss. I wouldn't be surprised if they don't have to remove part of that lung when they get her open. But she was conscious when we got her here and when they took her up for surgery, and still breathing on her own as best she could. She's got three surgeons working on her, and this is a good hospital. She's got a chance."

"Tell me where you are. We'll be there as soon as we can." Coulson said.

"Can you get to the nearest Stark facility? It might be better if I arrange transport from there for you? How many people are you bringing?" Tony asked.

"Six." He hadn't wanted to include Tripplett, but now he didn't see another option. "Stark, if anyone finds out where Victoria is…."

"We've got that covered. She's safe here. I'll make some calls and have transport ready for you. And if you could find some way to let your people know that back-up's coming, that might be good too. What were you thinking, not calling us when this first started?"

"Fury was wrong." May said as Coulson ended the call. "The secrecy, we should have told them, we should have told you." How much trouble could have been prevented if they had been honest from the start? What she had done, she had done to protect Coulson, to try to keep him safe, but hearing Stark and the others, suddenly more options, and probably better options hit her.

"It doesn't matter now. What matters is how do we tell Skye and Fitzsimmons that Ward's a traitor. And Victoria…." That bad, would she even be alive by the time they got to the hospital? Why hadn't he suspected Ward? He should have known something was wrong, and now two agents were dead, and a third good, loyal agent might loose her life because he screwed up.

"She's still fighting." May said, but hearing the description of Victoria's wounds, she was very much afraid it was a fight that she was going to lose.

There was a knock on the door, and Skye called. "AC, May, are the two of you in there?" And wasn't that a closet that their leaders were in? Maybe she shouldn't be knocking? What if they were…. Skye blushed and started to back away. "Never mind. Don't let me disturb you!"

"Skye, wait." Coulson said as he opened the door and stopped her retreat. And there was Fitzsimmons coming down the hall with Tripplett behind them. "We need to talk to all of you. We have a major problem."

"What's wrong?" Jemma asked. She had never seen someone look quite like Coulson looked before, like he had been punched in the stomach.

"I just got a call from Tony Stark." Coulson forced himself to speak. "The guards taking Garrett to the Fridge are dead. Victoria was shot three times, once in the stomach, twice in the back. She's in emergency surgery right now. Garrett's on the loose and Ward…."

"Ward's Hydra. He's the one who killed the guards and still might kill Victoria." May finished what Coulson couldn't bring himself to say.

"Ward's…." Skye was the only one who could speak and she wanted to ask if they were sure, but May and Coulson wouldn't have told them if they weren't sure. Hydra. Ward was… No, she would not think of Ward, not know. Think of their team, of her family and keeping it together. "What now?"

"Now we get to the nearest Stark facility and take whatever transport Stark's pulled together to get to the hospital, and we find a way to survive, all of us." Coulson said. He just hoped that there wouldn't have been another death to add to the total lost by the time they got there.


	6. Chapter 6

"You can contact Mother and Father quickly?" Thor asked his niece. "Where are they?"

"The island of Tahiti. They heard it was a magical place." Hela said. "I believe Agent Coulson can be held responsible for that too." She looked at the map Stark had drawn on his tablet, giving the approximate location of the Fridge. "I can get you close. I'm not sure if you'll appear right at it, but it will be close."

"Close is fine." And they had time. Escaping his nephews would have delayed those two villains considerably. There was no way they would reach the prison before him. Thor shook his head, still not sure how they had been able to escape, especially after one of them was kicked by Sleipnir. But they could worry about that problem later. Now they needed to focus on helping their allies.

"How can your contact your grandparents?" Jane asked as Thor vanished in another flash of blue light from Hela's necklace.

"I'm fairly sure that everyone on the island knows who Grandfather is by now." Hela said. "Mister Stark, would you happen to know how to find a phone number for me, of anyone at all on Tahiti?"

"Beach-side bar. Would that work?"

"Perfectly." Hela took the phone and waited a moment before someone answered. "Hello, I'm trying to find my grandparents. Have you by any chance seen my grandfather? He's rather large with one eye and might think that the proper way to request a refill of drinks is by throwing glassware on the floor. Yes, do you think you could call him to the phone, please? Or my grandmother, the rather nice lady who is with him? I'm afraid we've had a family emergency, and they need to come home."

"He's going to get Grandmother." Hela said. "Grandmother? That was fast. Have you seen the news? Yes, the situation with Shield."

"We've seen it." Frigga said. Shield was their ally, and to see them brought low like this, especially after what their son had done, something had to be done to assist them. "How can we help?"

"We were with Mister Stark when this happened, and then we stumbled across two Hydra agents attempted to dispose of two dead agents of Shield, and another who was barely alive. We believe they're heading for Shield's prison, to release their prisoners, and to seize any weapons they can get their hands on. Uncle Thor's on his way to assist them now. Can you call Heimdall and meet him there?" Hela asked.

"Your grandfather has had quite enough mai tais." Frigga said. "I'll collect him and we'll be on our way. Has your father finished repairing the royal prison yet? If we have to, we can move Shield's prisoners there."

"The prison is about the only thing that is repaired at the moment, since Lady Sif worked on it, instead of Volstagg and Fandral. Grandmother, the agent we found was injured severely. The doctors here are doing what they can to repair the damage and I gave her a bit of a basic strengthening potion so we could move her safely, but do you know of anything else that might be of some help?"

A mortal. Even when they had visited Midgard, to fight the Frost Giants, their actual interaction with mortals had been limited, and Frigga would be the first to admit they knew little about their biology. The only reason that their healers had been able to do the little they had done for Jane Foster was because her problems were due to the Aether. Repairing other injuries though, that would pose difficulties, but after a minute, something came to her. "I have nothing that would heal but I might have a potion that could offer something. If this woman has even a tiny spark of life left in her, it can preserve that, and give her time to heal on her own."

"That's what we need. This lady wrote a message in her own blood, to try to save the rest of Shield. She's fighting. You've got something that might give her time, that ought to do it." Tony said as he leaned over. "Thanks for helping us out, your ladyship. Or is it your majesty? Anyway, we appreciate it, and I'm not going to hold your son breaking my building against anyone anymore. I was probably going to blow it up anyway, or set it on fire. At least what Loki did, my insurance paid, so why don't we forget all of that?"

"Mister Stark, I assume. I think my husband will enjoy meeting you." And she had a feeling more than one building might be damaged if those two met. "Hela, keep a close watch. If this lady is as badly injured as you say, your gift might be most useful. I'll send the potion by Hunin as soon as I can."

"I know. Thank you, Grandmother. Your help may save many lives today." Hela said as she ended the call.

"Your grandparents are going to help?" Pepper asked.

"They'll be on their way as soon as they contact Heimdall." Hela confirmed. "And are those some of your law enforcement officials?"

"Looking for us to get a statement. Everyone, remember the story, we were taking a walk and found her. No clue who she is." Tony said as Hela dropped the spells she had used to give them privacy, and the police after shaking their heads and wondering how they had missed seeing the group hurried over to ask questions about the shooting and the unidentified victim.


	7. Chapter 7

The guards at the Fridge were understandably nervous. When Hydra had revealed themselves, they had been luckier than some of the other Shield bases. It didn't seem as if they had been infiltrated by as many Hydra agents, and the loyal agents had been able to quickly subdue them. Still, everyone was on edge, with the leadership of Shield in disarray, and no idea of how to identify possible traitors who were still hidden in their ranks. So understandably when there was a flash of blue light, and a figure appeared out of nowhere, the two guards securing the elevator jumped and almost hit themselves in the head with their guns in a panic.

"Wait. Is that…. Is that Thor?" One of the guards said when he got a better look at the man in front of them. Tall, broad shouldered, blond, not in his usual outfit, but what looked like a long-sleeved t-shirt with the front covered in blood and jeans, but still, he could swear it was the Asgardian Avenger.

"What would Thor be doing here?" the other guard asked.

"Could someone have called in the Avengers?" But were the Avengers even reachable, and if they were, with Shield in chaos, who could have called them?

Before they could think about it more, Thor knocked on the door. "I need to speak to your leaders right away." He called. "We believe that Hydra agents might be on their way here, to attack this facility. Who's in charge?"

"Agent Marley, sort of." The first guard said as he went to open the door.

"Hey, wait, Agent Hand said not to open the door for anyone but her!"

"Do you think a locked door would actually keep out an Asgardian? Agent Hand will be more upset if the door gets broken. And he's not from this planet. He's not Hydra." the first guard said as he opened the door and waved for Thor to come in. "Right this way. Agent Marley's downstairs."

"Thank you." Thor said. "My parents should be here shortly to assist in defending this place. If you could show them in when they arrive?"

They were about to be visited by Asgardian royalty? Did they need to roll out some sort of red carpet for that? Did they even have a red carpet? The second guard was debating where to look for a possible red carpet to spread out for royal visitors, when the elevator door opened and Agent Marley was standing there. "Agent Marley, this is…."

"Thor?" The agent's jaw dropped as he looked up at the Avenger, and after a moment he let out a sigh of relief. Help at last! "Agent Jake Marley. You won't believe how glad I am to see an ally."

"You're in charge of this base?" Thor asked as he followed the small, rather nervous looking agent down the hall.

"No, that would be Agent Russell, who was injured during the initial uprising by Hydra. He's currently unconscious in medical, and his second in command, Agent Anders was somewhere in transit from the Treehouse when this all started and we haven't been able to locate her. I'm from the accounting department. I was sent over to take a look at a supply issue, and somehow I ended up being the highest ranking agent on their feet and in the building."

"We believe that Hydra is on their way here even now, to attack this building, liberate any prisoners, and seize your weapons." Thor told him. "What do you have in the way of defenses?"

"Not as much as I would like if we're facing an external attack." Agent Marley said. "What makes you think that Hydra's headed here?" Not that it would be surprising if they were, given the prisoners and weapons housed there.

"Hydra took over a plane bound for this location. They shot the loyal agents onboard, and left the bodies where they were luckily found quickly."

"Agent Hand." Marley winced, realizing at once what had happened. And then he noticed the blood on Thor's shirt, and the fact that they spelled out letters and numbers in what seemed to be a very shaky but familiar writing style. "She was still alive when she was found?"

"She fought bravely and truly earned a place in Valhalla this day." Thor said. "Even on the point of death her thoughts were for her comrades and defeating this monstrous foe."

"That's her. A lot of people missed that about her. I'll show you the defenses. Maybe you can make some suggestions. One thing I'm worried about, though, is going into a battle without a way to be sure that we've rooted out all of the Hydra infiltrators. I've noticed a few funny things about the agents that turned, but not enough to make sure we have them all."

"My mother can help you with that. We have a few things that can be used to reveal the truth." Thor said. It was a shame that his brother just happened to be highly allergic to all of them.

"Mother!" Loki was waiting at the Bifrost when Frigga and Odin appeared, looking frazzled, a large basket on one arm, a small bottle in the other hand and three ravens circling his head. "How was your vacation? Ready to come back and take over the throne once more?"

"Is the palace repaired?" Odin asked.

"The number of people hit by fallen masonry has dropped to an all time low and no one has tumbled through a floor recently. I am counting that as a vast improvement. And I believe after six months that Fandral might have grasped the concept of a load bearing wall."

"We're sure you're doing just fine, running things and repairing all of the damage to the palace." Frigga said. "Do you have the potions I requested?"

"I had Hildy pack the truth telling potions." Loki said as he handed the basket over. "They make me itch just touching them. What are those mortals doing down there? Did I hear correctly that the Nazis are trying to take over again?" Nazis and his children being on Midgard, that was definitely a situation he did not approve of, and he was surprised that his brother wasn't already hustling his niece and nephew back up to the Bifrost.

"Hela and the boys are fine." Frigga handed a bottle to one of the ravens. "Take this to Hela as fast as you can and tell her that just a few drops should be enough to help."

"You did raise mature, capable, responsible children." Odin said.

"I know. I sometimes wonder how I failed so greatly. So I take it you aren't here to relieve me of my punishment? Would it help if I swear that I will never even think of taking over Asgard or any other realm again?" Loki said. "I couldn't be paid enough to take over anything again."

"You're doing a wonderful job. Six months and Fandral's already learnt what a load bearing wall is? I didn't expect him to grasp that concept for at least a year. What about the prison? Is it secure?" Frigga asked.

"Secure, and Sif and Hogun have managed to return a number of our prisoners to custody." Loki said.

"Good. We may have prisoners to move from Midgard soon." Odin said.

"Prisoners from Midgard. So you're going to help Shield with their problems then? If you see Agent Coulson, let him know if he wishes to press charges against me over that stabbing incident, I will happily surrender!"

"We're sure he'll agree that our punishment is much more fitting than any prison." Frigga said. "In the meantime, can you go through the library and look for any of the manuscripts your grandfather Bor picked up at that, I think they call it a fire sale on Midgard. I know Hela has most of them, but there might be a few she missed. And if there was something that could help an injured mortal, it would have to be in one of those manuscripts.


	8. Chapter 8

"So you have no idea at all what might have happened out there?" Detective Andrews asked Tony and the group surrounding him. "No sound of gunshots or any other noise?"

Tony shook his head. "We really wish we could help you. But we didn't hear anything. I bought the property just a few months ago, and this is our first time down here."

"I'm just glad we found her when we did and were able to get her to the hospital, hopefully in time." Pepper added.

"Now how you found this woman. There's something I don't understand about that." Detective Andrews's partner, Detective Monroe said. "It was what, ten or eleven at night, none of you have been to this area before, and you suddenly decide to go for a walk in the swamp? That just doesn't make sense to me."

"It should. Have you ever been there at night? It was beautiful." Hela said. "A world away from everything, almost magical. At least it was until we found that poor lady. You will be able to find out what happened to her and who she is, won't you? I hate to think that she might have someone worrying for her at this very moment."

"We're sure we'll be able to figure it out. No id, but her height ought to help a lot with identifying her. Not many women are that tall." Detective Monroe said. "Mister Stark, would you mind coming with us and showing us where you found the victim? We need to get CSI to process the area. Maybe we'll get lucky and find something to identify the shooter."

"Of course. Whatever you need." Tony said. "Pepper, do you want to…."

"We'll stay here." Pepper said. "That poor woman got hurt on our property. It doesn't seem right to just go home and go to bed when someone who got hurt just a few feet away from us is fighting for her life in surgery. You can come and pick us up as soon as you're finished with the police."

"Good, that's good. Here, I'll call and let you know what's going on, alright?" Tony handed his phone over to Pepper before standing and heading for the door with the police beside him.

"What about the other two bodies?" Darcy whispered as soon as they were gone. "The police are going to be suspicious if they find two more people with gunshot wounds we forgot to mention."

"Jor called Papa and had him send the one of the Valkyries to bring them to Asgard. They'll be safe there until other arrangements can be made." Hela said. "And until the police are gone, my brothers will be waiting in the swamps and well out of sight."

"That's good. Not that your brothers aren't wonderful, but most people tend to panic at the sight of snakes." Pepper said as she stood. "So, surgical waiting room, do you think?"

"That would be a good idea, but they're probably not going to tell us anything." Bruce said.

"They will if I ask." Hela said. She didn't like to use her father's talents, to touch people's minds and give them a bit of a push, but she did know how, and in this circumstance, she didn't see it as wrong. After all, if they could identify the poor lady, Agent Coulson would be the proper person to give information on her condition to, and he would surely agree that until he got there that they could be kept informed in his stead.

They had just entered the surgical waiting room when the phone Pepper was holding rang.

"Hello? Phil?" she said as the group hurried to a corner, and Hela cast her spells once more to give them privacy.

"Pepper?" Coulson said.

"Phil, you won't believe how good it is to hear your voice." Pepper said. Not that she wasn't about what had happened. She had been devastated when Tony told her Phil had been killed, and to find out it was a lie… "Faking your death, though? You didn't do that because of Tony, did you? Because if you did, I'm afraid you might give half of our company terrible ideas. Especially if we top our current record of four visits in one week by the bomb squad."

"Pepper, you won't believe how sorry I am about this entire situation." Coulson said. That was something he hadn't even considered, having to talk to people who had been his friends and try to come up with some sort of justification for what had been done. But he could think about that later. "Stark said he could arrange transport for us. Do you think you could arrange to get the injured agents from medical transported to a hospital? Glenn Talbot is on his way to take over, and I'm sure taking care of our wounded isn't going to be a priority."

"Talbot? Wait, let me talk to him." Betty waved for Pepper to give her the phone. "Agent Coulson, this is Betty Ross, well, Betty Ross-Banner now."

"Banner, as in Bruce…."

"As of roughly fourteen hours ago, yes. If we had known you weren't dead, we would have invited you to the wedding." Betty said with a smile before focusing on the situation. "Did you say that Glenn Talbot is on his way?"

"To take over the Hub, yes." Victoria would kill him for losing her base when she found out. First one of the men on his team turned out to be a traitor and shot her three times, and now he was losing her base. She would definitely kill him as soon as she was strong enough to get her hands on a weapon. "Some of our people are going to stay and surrender but…"

"Surrender to Glenn Talbot?" Betty said. "That's a…. Talk to your people. I'm General Ross's daughter, and I can tell them right now that if they expect to surrender to Glenn Talbot and get quickly processed through the system and cleared, it isn't going to happen. At best they're going to get drug off to lock-up somewhere for who knows how long, and if any of them have skills the military might find useful…."

"If they want to surrender, tell them to go to Stark Industries first." Pepper said. "At least we can make sure they have lawyers and their rights are protected. And if you can get your injured there, we'll look after them." And maybe Tony could contact Rhodey and see if he knew a member of the military that could be trusted, if the military had to be involved? What if these people ended up surrendering themselves to Hydra? "I'm not sure you should turn over that base either, at least not until we know more."

"We could hold out in a fight, but I'm not sure if we want to start that." Coulson said.

"You don't have to." Hela said. "A shielding spell would work nicely."

"Hildy? She's remarkably good at shields." Leah said.

"But not quite strong enough to cover an entire base yet. But if Papa could craft the spell, she could activate it." Hela said just as a large raven that no one outside of their little group seemed to see came fluttering in and dropped a bottle into her hands, before perching on Fenrir's head and croaking a message.

"Here, Huginn, take this to Papa, please." Hela quickly scribbled a message on a scrap of paper torn from a magazine, and handed it to the bird, who vanished in a flapping of wings. "Agent Coulson, you might remember Lord Volstagg. He'll be along shortly with his daughter to seal your building. Make sure all of your people are safely clear by then. Once the shielding spell is activated, no one will be able to go in or out until it is removed."

"Legally, sealing the building is probably the best idea." Pepper added. "Not that I'm a lawyer or anything, but with everything that's going on, if you turn it over, how could you be sure you're not turning it over to Hydra?"

"Although if Hydra recruited Glenn Talbot they're really scraping the bottom of the barrel." Betty said. "Or they like bad mustaches." Wait. Hydra was Nazi, wasn't it? Maybe the bad mustache thing wasn't so far off!

"Thank you." Coulson said. That these people were willing to help them…. What in the world had Fury been thinking, with the entire faking his death for longer than the days that he had been dead thing? And why hadn't he questioned that before now? "Have you heard anything about Victoria yet?"

"We're waiting in the surgical lounge." Bruce said as he took the phone from Betty. "But at this point, the longer it goes without us hearing something, the better it is for her. If they have to take part of that lung out, and I'm betting that they will, it's going to take awhile, and then there was the abdominal trauma on top of that. I wouldn't expect to hear anything for at least six to eight hours."

"Okay. If one of you could stay there until…."

"We'll be here. Don't worry." Pepper said as Bruce handed the phone back. "Take care of your people. We'll take care of Agent Hand for you until you get here."


	9. Chapter 9

"Mother, Father." Thor said as one of the agents from the elevator escorted his parents in, and even though he was seriously annoyed with them, he breathed a sigh of relief to see his mother alive and well. "I trust you had a nice vacation."

"Philip, Son of Coul, was right. Tahiti is truly a magical place." Odin said with a rare smile. And perhaps once they dealt with these Hydra villains, they would return for another visit. Loki seemed to be managing fine, after all. Really, he didn't know why they hadn't thought of this sooner. But for now they would focus on their enemies. "What are the defenses of this place?"

"It seems to me that the strongest defense is that there is only one access point, that elevator." Thor said.

"One access point." Definitely highly defensible, and how many men could fit into the elevator if the door did fall? Under ten, Odin was sure.

"The lower floors can't be breached?" Frigga asked.

"They would have to bring in seriously heavy artillery to get through, and they would probably bring half the building down trying." Agent Marley said. At least this was one thing he knew, the specifics of the building. There had been enough grumbling throughout the accounting department about the costs, so he ought to know.

"So if we can keep them from taking that entrance, we can stop them." Thor said.

"Right. The only thing I'm worried about is whether or not there could be more hidden Hydra agents still in our ranks. There are roughly a thousand people assigned to the Fridge and because of our location, those people are almost permanently on site. Of those, we only had fifty who revealed themselves as Hydra. I'm hoping that's a good sign, but still, if you have a way to clear people it would be a big help."

"We do. How many were injured during the initial attack?" Frigga asked.

"Over a hundred injured seriously enough to be confined to medical. I'm not sure how many minor injuries." Agent Marley said, just as there was a knock on the door.

"Sir?" The agent on the other side was practically shaking when the door was opened, and she was clutching the tablet she was holding so hard it was a wonder she didn't break it. "We received an update. Raina, the scientist who was captured when Agent Coulson was kidnapped, has been freed from the prison she was being held in. The description of the man who freed her matches Agent Grant Ward."

"The one who was behind most of the Centipede super soldier experiments?" Marley said. "And you're…."

"Agent Alissa Jeffries, Level 2 psychologist." she stammered as she looked into the room and spotted Thor and his parents. She wanted to run. Being in the same area as someone important never seemed to end well for her, which explained why she was still a level 2 even after eight years with Shield, but she had a serious problem to report. "Sir, we've been checking the prisoners that Agent Nicholas was working with, and we have serious trouble. No one seems to know what she did, but it looks like she was attempting to enhance their powers, instead of finding a way to control them. I'm not sure it's even safe to send anyone in to a cell with Marcus Daniels at this point."

"We have experience housing prisoners with abilities." Thor said. "If you wish, we could move these people to Asgard for their safety and yours."

"That would be a big help." Agent Marley said. Help with their prisoners, help weeding out any infiltrators that might remain, maybe they would be able to hold the Fridge. Agent Hand had died, trying to save Shield, and trying to warn them about Hydra. They owed it to her to ensure that her sacrifice wasn't in vain. "How long ago did they hit the prison and free Raina?"

"Half an hour." Agent Jeffries said as she reluctantly eased into the room. No sign of coffee. Thank goodness there was no sign of coffee in here. She had developed a phobia of that beverage after spilling it on Agent Blake three times in one day and earning her exile to the Fridge.

"So we have at least three hours before they get here, and that's if they don't make further stops." Agent Marley said.

"That's more than enough time." Odin declared. "Show us your defenses. My dear, if you could…."

"If someone could show me somewhere to work, I can start testing your people." Frigga said. "And if one of you would call for Heimdall, we can send any prisoners you feel should be moved to Asgard as well."

"The cafeteria would work. Agent Jeffries, could you show her?"

The cafeteria? Didn't they have a whole lot of coffee pots in there? Just please don't let this end up like the disaster with Agent Blake. The little psychologist waved for Frigga to follow her as she led her down the hallway and to the elevator that would take them to her personal den of horrors.

"Do you think it's taking Tony a long time to get back?" Pepper asked the group in general. How long had he been gone? Over an hour? What if the police had figured out that they were lying about the entire situation? They had a good reason, true, but she doubted law enforcement would see it that way.

"Maybe you could call him and check on how things are going?" Jane suggested. "No, you have his phone, don't you? Hela, do you know any spells that would let us see what's going on out at the house?"

"I've only been able to make the observation spell work for around fifty of your yards." Hela said. "I could see if Jor could get closer to the house if that might help. What one of the three of us sees, the other two can as well if we wish."

"How…." Darcy started to ask for an explanation, but then Hela was looking at something, just past them. "Dead people? Are there dead people here again?"

"You need to go back." Hela tuned the others out, and focused on the figure in front of her, a rather bewildered looking Victoria Hand.

"What?" Victoria shook her head, trying to focus. Banner, Bruce Banner. She recognized him right away and was that Pepper Potts as well? How had the Avengers ended up here, or one Avenger and the associates of two others? But if they were here… "You need to warn the others. Hydra's heading for the Fridge. Coulson, call him, tell him what happened!" She had tried to write out the number for the phone she had given him with the only thing she had, but had they understood what the numbers had meant?

"We know. My uncle and my grandparents are there now. You've done your duty." Hela stood and eased over to Victoria, reaching out with gentle magical probes. The thread binding her to life was there, as thin as a spiderweb but still there. "You need to go back now."

"Is she seeing Agent Hand?" Betty whispered. "Bruce?"

"Can you show me what's going on in that OR?" Bruce whispered to Leah. Maybe if they knew what was going on, they could somehow help, but how did you help a spirit?

"Maybe." Leah cast the spell, and a moment later the images from the operating room flickered into existence, although there was no sound this time.

"What's going on?" Pepper asked. But the number of doctors crowded around the still figure on the table, and the amount of blood, that couldn't be good.

Bleeding from the abdomen. That looked like where the blood was pouring from. "The liver, I think. They must have a bleeder they can't get a clamp on."

"Is that…." Victoria whispered as she approached the images flickering in mid-air. "Am I dead?" And then there was pain, like being kicked in the chest, pain bad enough to drop her to her knees.

"It's alright. You're not dead." Hela caught her and eased her down onto the floor, a blue glow flashing from her hands as she touched Victoria, pain shooting up her arms from the contact. "You're hurt very badly, but you're not dead. You need to go back now, though. Shield still needs you. This isn't your time. Go back."

Internal defibrillator. He was almost sure that one of the doctors had applied the internal defibrillator at the same time that Agent Hand crumpled in pain to the floor. "Tell her to go towards the pain. The doctors are trying to bring her back. If she goes towards that, it might get her back in her body." Was he suggesting medical treatment for a spirit?

"Can you do that?" Hela said as she focused her powers despite the pain the continuing contact caused her, focused on sending as much of her strength as she dared into the confused and badly shaken spirit. "This isn't your time. Go back!"

Pain. There was more pain, another jolt to her chest, but Victoria forced herself to push through it. No matter how much it hurt, she wasn't ready to die yet. And then she felt a tug as the pain abruptly faded and blackness pulled her under.

"You can do more than seeing dead people, can't you?" Darcy said as she hurried over and helped Hela up. "You can let other people see them too? How did you do that?"

"Physical contact, but I've never tried interaction with someone who wasn't dead, but was hovering on the brink before." Hela said. "Is she alright?"

"There's a heartbeat." Bruce said after a moment of studying the flickering images. Faint and unsteady, but she was back, and more units of blood were being rapidly pushed, to hopefully keep that faint beat going. "She's still got a chance if they can stop the bleeding. She's still got a chance."


	10. Chapter 10

"Are the defenses ready?" Frigga asked when her husband and son came into the cafeteria several hours later, just as she finished with testing the last of the badly shaken agents.

"Ready, and Lady Sif has moved the last of the prisoners that there was some concern about to Asgard." Thor said. "Have you found any more traitors?"

"It seems the rest of the agents are loyal to Shield." Frigga said. "We just finished testing the last of them.

"It's strange, though." Alissa said from where she had been sitting, checking off agents on a tablet as they were cleared and trying to keep well out of range of any beverages hot or otherwise that she might knock over. "I've been here eight years now, and the agents that were cleared fit. They're most of them are level fours and fives, who have been with Shield at least five or six years. Except for a few people like Agent Nicholas, the agents who turned were level one and twos who joined in the last year or so. Not that being a level two is suspicious. I'm a two, but it's because I spilled hot coffee on a superior officer three times in one day and then blew up his coffee maker. I'll probably spend the rest of my career as a level two. But these people had great records, and they actually asked for the Fridge as their first assignment out of the academy. Agent Marley, have you ever heard of anyone asking for this place as a first assignment?"

"I noticed that too." Agent Marley said, and when he saw the Asgardians' confused looks, he explained. "The Fridge is an important Shield base, but it isn't exactly a top assignment. If you're assigned here, you're basically in the building twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, until you complete a rotation of at least six months. We're in an isolated location so you can't visit anything on your days off. This place is important, but it's just not an assignment that most people would jump on right out of the academy. The Triskelion, the Hub, the Sandbox, those are places people want to go. The Fridge, this is where Shield sends you. Something's definitely off, with so many of the Hydra infiltrators being new agents and actually requesting the assignment here." But could that help with weeding out more traitors elsewhere? All he could do was to note the findings and hopefully Thor and his family would be able to get the information to someone in authority. But who was left in command now? Agent Hand was dead. The director was dead. Who knew where Agent Hill was. Agent Blake was in the hospital. Agent Garrett and Agent Sitwell were Hydra, although that was kind of strange about Sitwell, a Hispanic man joining a Nazi organization? What sense did that make? Who else was left, Coulson? Maybe Coulson was running things? He hoped SOMEONE was trying to run things. But before he could think about it further, an announcement came in over the intercom.

"We have a prisoner transport inbound. Arrival time in five minutes. The ID they're transmitting is for the plane that departed the Hub with Agent Hand, bringing John Garrett in for detention. We're also picking up five other aircraft, hovering just out of our normal detection range. We're assuming at least a hundred Hydra agents are on board based on the size and configuration."

"Get your people into position." Odin ordered. "My dear, can you provide a safe place for the wounded and non-combatants?"

"Already done." After a thousand years of marriage did her husband really think he could tell her anything that she hadn't already thought of much earlier? "Will we be waiting on the roof for these traitors, then?"

"They've already met Hela and Sleipnir." Thor said. "I think we should definitely introduce them to the rest of our family."

Even knowing that they were facing a Hydra traitor who had killed a level 8 senior agent, the two guards who met the Asgardians were willing to carry out their part, and were waiting at the closed doors when Ward stepped off of the plane with the seemingly secured Garrett. To hear that traitor talking about Agent Hand, though, after what he had done, it was all they could do to hold their positions to give the Asgardians time to get ready, and to lull the other aircraft into coming within striking distance.

"Something isn't right." Thor looked closely at the two traitors from behind the illusion his mother was cloaking them in. "Sleipnir kicked one of them, and Pepper burned the other, but now they have hardly a mark on them?"

"Even Asgardian technology would be hard pressed to repair damage from that so quickly." Frigga murmured. Something was definitely wrong and she sent out a careful magical probe to try to determine what it might be.

At least this was going right. After what had happened in the swamp with those women, he had been a bit worried. Tony Stark's girlfriend, and Stark had Shield connections. But apparently he hadn't been able to alert anyone, because the guards didn't have a clue that Hand was dead. "You want me to contact Agent Hand to turn around and come back here? Do you know how angry that will make her?" Ward said, just as a aircraft came swooping in an firing at them.

But instead of what he expected, the guards throwing open the doors against all protocol to help their fellow agent, the skies suddenly turned dark, storm clouds appearing Trying to capture g out of nowhere, and a bolt of lightning slamming into the aircraft, and sending it careening away from the building.

Lightning. Ward had a bad, bad feeling that was confirmed as he looked up. Thor was there, hammer out, and then two more people, a one eyed man that had to be Odin and then a woman that reminded him of the girl that had stopped them in the swamp appeared out of nowhere.

Asgardians. Somehow the Asgardians had found out what was going on, and had came to the aid of their allies. Maybe they should have weighted those bodies down. Vic had obviously somehow lived long enough to pass information along to them. Garrett tried to go for his communicator, to warn the other planes off, but it was too late. They were already in range of the Fridge's defenses, anti-aircraft guns were firing as Thor took to the air, to assist them in putting the planes down. Not good, this was not good.

"Aren't you supposed to order us to surrender?" Ward said as Frigga approached him, sword out, while her husband moved towards Garrett.

"Did you offer any of the innocents you slaughtered that curtesy? Did either of you show mercy when you threw a woman who was barely clinging to life into a swamp to drown?" And although she hadn't been able to determine exactly what was wrong with the pair, her probe had been enough to indicate that there was something very, very wrong indeed there. Trying to take these two alive could only lead to a disaster, and more innocents endangered.

He was fast and had apparently learned a few things, because Ward didn't try to pull a weapon, just dodging and swinging, trying for a hit or a kick that he couldn't get in, Frigga watched him move critically, as she pushed him back towards the edge of the roof, her blade making nicks and cuts but not a finishing blow, not yet. She wanted to test him as much as she could, to try to figure out what he was, before she did that.

One of the planes swung wildly, trying to dodge the weapons firing from the building, and Thor's lightning, clipping the edge of the roof before crashing to the ground. And Ward took advantage of that to try to lunge forward, only to end up with Frigga's sword shoved through him, before he was falling, tumbling off the roof and heading a hundred floors down to the ground.

"Mother? Father?" Thor called as he landed on the roof.

"What happened to the other one?" Frigga demanded as she looked down at her sword. The blood she had drawn with her nicks and cuts had been red but this, when she had ran him through, what was streaking her blade was a greenish-grey fluid.

"He through himself off the roof." Odin's one eye went up at the sight of what was on the sword. He thought the man had chosen death over capture but…. "Do you have any idea what they might be?"

"I'm not sure. But whatever they are, it's nothing good." Frigga said. She turned to Thor. "Go. See if you can find the one I stabbed. We need to know what these creatures are." If she hadn't killed him, hopefully he was wounded badly enough to prevent his escape. She had a very, very bad feeling about this.


	11. Chapter 11

The limo pulled to a stop in front of the hospital's main entrance, and let Coulson's team out. Normally, a fancy limo like the one Stark had sent for them he would have his youngest team members bouncing like crazy but they were all quiet, Fitzsimmons with Triplett hovering protectively over them and Skye, silent and closed off.

"Surgical waiting room. That's where they said they were when I called." Coulson said, but he didn't make a move towards the door.

"Six to eight hours. They should know something by now." May said.

"It's a good hospital." Jemma offered. "I looked it up online. They deal with very high levels of trauma here. With Shield facilities out, Agent Hand's best chance is to be in a place like this."

"And it sounded like they got her here fast. That's good, right?" Skye said.

Fast, but who knows how long it had been from the shooting until Victoria was found? If she had lost 60 percent of her blood by the time they got her here, he was afraid it had been awhile, or that her injuries were so massive that the chances of a repair being successful… Three gunshots, two that hit the lung. Skye had only been shot twice, to the abdomen, not the chest, and she would have died without the GH-325. As much as Coulson wanted to believe there was hope, he just couldn't let himself feel it. And if Victoria died…. Letting Ward get on that plane with Garrett, even if he had no clue he was anything other than what he appeared to be, a loyal Shield agent, it was a recipe for disaster from the start and now thanks to his mistake two people were dead and Victoria….

"Hey!" A voice called, snapping him out of his dark thoughts. He looked up and Darcy was hurrying out of the hospital towards them. "Finally! Stark sent me to wait for you. Darcy Lewis, intern and victim of Ipod theft." She said to the others as an introduction. "Have any of you seen him with an Ipod, because I tried calling Shield after he pulled that whole faking his death thing and they didn't have a clue where it was. Everyone's up in the surgical waiting room. You'll need me to show you were to go. Thor's niece has spells set up to keep people from noticing us and everything, so you wouldn't be able to find anyone on your own."

"Victoria's still in surgery?" May asked as they followed the young woman into the hospital and crowded into one of the elevators for the trip upstairs.

"They had to call in some sort of specialist a couple of hours in. That kind of delayed things. But Doctor Banner can explain it better than I can. You know, for someone with a giant green rage monster sharing their head, he's really calm. I mean, he just got married, they barely had a chance to kiss and now he's spending his wedding night in a hospital waiting room instead of in a hotel or at least back at Stark's place, and he hasn't blown up once."

When they stepped into the waiting room, they didn't see anything besides other families, sitting slumped in chairs, exhausted and frightened, waiting for news. But then Tony Stark appeared out of nowhere and grabbed hold of Phil.

"There you are!" Tony said as he drug the group under the shelter of Hela's illusion and silencing spells. "Pepper, look who's here, and not dead!"

"Phil!" Pepper jumped up and hugged him hard before shooting Tony a look. "Tony, behave. He's had a bad enough day without your making it worse by being yourself. Did you get your people somewhere safe? I've alerted legal about the situation and they're happy to help. They're happy to help with any situation that doesn't involve Tony and possible explosions. I think someone was singing the Hallelujah Chorus when I told them they were going to get to handle something that didn't involve Tony for a change."

"They're safe." Phil said. And he couldn't find the words to thank them for what they had done, finding Victoria, getting her help, sending help to the Fridge, helping get the other agents to safety.

"You're able to watch the surgery?" Jemma said as she caught sight of the images flickering in the air. "How are you doing that?"

"I have a spell for observation." Hela said as she looked up. "Actually Lord Volstagg's daughter Hildy deserves the credit for finding it. "I'm afraid that the images aren't the best, and we lost sound due to the distance."

"No sound, that's fine." Jemma murmured as their team clustered around, trying to see what was going on. Having to watch someone they knew fighting for her life on an operating table was bad enough without having to hear it too. "They had to call in another doctor?"

"They hit a bleeder they had a hard time stopping in her abdomen. I'm thinking that the liver was probably damaged." Bruce said.

"They tried clamping off the hepatoduodenal ligament?" Jemma asked as she studied the flickering images. It was hard to see, but Agent Hand's blood pressure still looked much too low in spite of the blood that was still being rapidly infused. Not good.

"It slowed the bleeding, but didn't stop it. That's when they called in the fourth doctor. It looks like they're going for a resection."

"Okay, I don't speak doctor, but that doesn't sound good to me." Skye said. "Resection? Is that some fancy way to fix the liver, or is it taking the liver out? And I'm hoping it isn't taking the liver out, because don't you really, really need your liver?"

"It's taking the damaged part out, to hopefully stop the bleeding. If it works, the rest should be able to regenerate, given time." Bruce said. "She has good doctors working on her, and they've been able to keep her heart and blood pressure stable after they ran into some trouble. She's got a chance."

Liver damaged, lung damaged. How much of a chance could Victoria have with that degree of trauma? And if she did survive, what sort of condition would she be left in after such severe injuries? Why hadn't he suspected Ward? He should have suspected Ward when he found out about Garrett. This should not have happened. Maybe what Fury was worried about was right, maybe he was losing his mind. Before New York, he would have never screwed things up this badly, and now because of him, people were dead, Victoria might be dying. Turn over the team to May. He should do that before he got anyone else hurt.

"Excuse me, Agent Coulson?" Hela asked as she slowly approached him. She had been a bit nervous about speaking to him after what her father had done, but she felt she had to let him know what she was seeing. "But could I ask why you have a compulsion spell on you?"


	12. Chapter 12

"A compulsion spell?" Coulson said as he looked at the girl, clad in a long white, sleeveless dress with what he at first thought was a dog but then realized was a wolf at her side. Hela. Someone had mentioned the name Hela. Hela, Loki's daughter. That had to be her.

"What's a compulsion spell, and how can you tell he's got one on him?" Skye asked.

"A compulsion spell creates the irresistible urge to do something when it's triggered. It's not hard to see if you know what to look for." Hela stood and slowly circled Coulson, examining the spell she had detected. It hadn't been activated, she could tell that much at least.

"A spell. Loki." Coulson said. Was there no end to the trouble that the Asgardian was causing for him?

"No, it's not Papa." Hela said.

"Loki's the only one I've been around who can do magic, or whatever it is that Asgardians do that looks like magic."

"But Papa tried to kill you. He wouldn't try to kill you and put a compulsion spell on you at the same time. That would make absolutely no sense." Hela motioned for Leah to join her. "I don't think the spell's Asgardian at all."

"Not Asgardian. It's been a bit so I'm not totally sure, but it doesn't feel Norn either." Leah said as she circled Coulson as well. "Could it be Midgardian?"

"I don't think so." Hela though for a moment. "At least it doesn't feel similar to any of the traditions the Midgardian magical practitioners I've met have followed. Are you sure you haven't encountered anyone besides Papa who practices magic?"

"I think I would remember something like that." Coulson said.

"You wouldn't if you weren't awake." Skye said. "That spell, how do you cast it or whatever?"

"It depends on the practitioner." Hela said. "Papa can do it with a gesture, but I have no clue who could have cast this spo ell, so I have no idea how they might have done it?"

"Can you tell how old it is? Could it have been from around the time of New York?"

"Maybe. It isn't one of Papa's spells. The few times he's used compulsion spells, he's gone for embarrassment. Not the kind of spell he would use with someone he was trying to kill. And it hasn't been activated. Papa's spells always go off shortly after he casts, at least spells like that. He wants to make sure he's there to enjoy them, like the time he made Lord Tyr howl like a wolf in the middle of a feast for three hours once."

"Skye are you thinking…." Coulson said. Was that even possible? "Could someone cast a spell like that on an object, say something that could be injected?"

An injected spell. "It would work. There's no reason it wouldn't work. I've never heard of it being tried before. There are much, much simpler ways to cast spells but…."

"What if someone was trying to hide what they were doing?" Darcy suggested. "Put a spell on a shot, the person who gets the shot starts acting funny, they blame it on a vaccine reaction or whatever. Who's going to think of magic or start poking around looking for someone who could do magic?"

"What is this injection you're talking about?" Bruce asked.

"It's complicated, probably too complicated to get into now." Coulson said. Right now, the focus needed to be on Victoria and hopefully getting her through this alive. "Whatever this is, it isn't active? Can you tell if anyone else has something similar on them?"

"No, it's not active." Hela reached out and gently scanned the people who had accompanied Coulson. "She's different. I doubt such a spell would attach to her." she said as she looked at Skye. "The others seem fine."

"Then we worry about this later. That is we worry about it later if you don't think it's going to get activated."

"If it hasn't been activated by now, a few hours shouldn't hurt." Hela said. "And I would like Grandmoher to take a look at that spell if possible. She might be able to figure out something that I'm missing."

Just then Jane's phone rang, making her jump. "Hello?" Thor, thank goodness! She sighed when she heard his voice. And then she was smiling at his news. "Right, Coulson's here. I'll tell him."

"Hydra tried to attack the Fridge, Thor and his parents were waiting for them, the defenses were all armed. They didn't know what hit them. They're sending the Hydra agents back to Asgard to be held now."

"What about Garrett and Ward?" Triplett asked. "Did they get them?"

"Did they…" Jane asked. "That's… Okay, I'll tell them. And when you come back, do you think your mother would mind coming with you? Hela needs to ask her to help with something."

"They didn't get them?" Skye said when Jane ended the call.

"Garrett got away, at least they think he did. He threw himself off the roof."

"Death rather than let them take him? That doesn't sound like John." Coulson said. "He would still think that he could find a way out of any cell they tried to put him in."

"That's the thing. Queen Frigga ran the other one, Agent Ward, through, and he fell off the roof. Only what was left on her sword wasn't blood, but some sort of greenish-grey stuff I don't want to think of. And when they checked down below, there was a rather large puddle of that goo, roughly the size of a body."

"Ward was an alien?" Skye said. Not that she had anything against aliens, but one that was filled with greenish-grey goo, not good! At least she had only kissed him, though. May had actually slept with him. They probably ought to be dragging her off right now for some sort of painful shots to ward off any diseases from that. What sort of awful diseases could a greenish-grey goo filled alien cause, anyway? And how did they end up with an alien on their team without anyone knowing? "Does Shield have a really, really good policy on not discriminating, because I would like to object to it if so. I don't mind aliens, but I would really like to know if any of my teammates might be shedding green-gray goo on me."

"And there wasn't anything from Garrett?" Coulson asked.

"Not according to Thor." Jane said. "But he hadn't taken what would likely be a fatal blow for any species. He was likely able to get away."

Coulson nodded. Aliens. Ward and likely Garrett as well were aliens? But what could he do about that at the moment with Shield in tatters and his team in shock? The only thing he could actually see that he could do was to offer up prayers that despite her injuries that Victoria survived. She had managed even bleeding to death to pass along the information that had held Shield together. Fighting that hard, she had to pull through.


	13. Chapter 13

They waited for hours, not talking, not sure of what to say after the report from the Fridge and what Hela had told them. Coulson lifted his head and then dropped it again. An alien? Could Ward really have been an alien, and if so, for how long? And Garrett? Was it possible he was an alien too? What was going on? Aliens on top of Hydra? What in the world was going on? And how had he missed this? He had dealt with aliens. An alien had nearly killed him. He shouldn't have missed this.

"Isn't that the doctor from the emergency room?" Tony said suddenly as he spotted the first doctor who had worked on Victoria coming down the hall. They had seen enough with Hela's spell to know that the surgery was over, but after that Victoria had been moved out of the spell's reach so they had no clue what was going on at the moment.

Hela nodded as she released the spells that were hiding them from view.

"Let me do the talking. You can convince him to give us information, right?" Tony asked Hela.

"I don't like interfering in the minds of others, but yes." Hela said. "And I can convince him to forget that he's talked to us as well."

"Good." Tony said as the group approached the doctor. "Doctor? Doctor Martin, isn't it? We were the ones who brought that lady from the swamp in. How is she?"

"I'm not supposed to release that information to anyone but family." the doctor said as he looked around to see if anyone from the police department was there. He had the three bullets that they had pulled ready to be turned over to them. Hopefully those would be of some help in identifying the shooter. Whoever was responsible for those shots was someone he wanted off the street as soon as possible.

"She was hurt on our property." Pepper moved slightly, blocking the sight of Hela's hands, her fingers sparkling with light blue sparks as she cast a light spell. "Stark Industries is going to be covering the expenses for her, at least until the police find out who she is and who her family is. Surely you can tell us something."

"She made it through surgery." Doctor Martin didn't know why, but he was suddenly talking to the group of people clustered around him. "Wait, why don't we go to one of the family rooms for some privacy?"

"Alright." He said as soon as the group was in the room and the door was closed. Some part of him knew that taking to complete strangers about a patient's condition wasn't something he should be doing, but another part of him was saying that telling this people what was going on was the right thing to do. "Miss… I wish I had a name for her. I don't suppose you've seen anyone from the police department, have you? Somehow Jane Doe doesn't seem to fit."

"The police were still searching out at the swamp when I left, but as far as I know they hadn't found anything that looked like ID." Tony said. "Give me some time and I'll think up something for a name. Legal or Accounting or Human Resources or whoever handles paying the bills for something like this is probably going to want something more than Jane Doe."

Doctor Martin nodded, although he really hoped the police would come through with an ID before his patient got stuck with whatever name Tony Stark could dream up. "You know that she had been shot three times. She was in severe shock, and had lost an estimated 60 percent of her blood volume by the time we started treating her."

"The hemothorax, haw bad was that?" Bruce asked, although he already had some clue thanks to Hela's spell.

"One of the most severe I've seen, and I've worked in the ER here for fifteen years now." Doctor Martin said as he went over to a whiteboard on the wall and drew an illustration. "The first shot went into her back and hit the upper lobe of her right lung. The second shot was almost on top of that, but a fraction off, doing damage to the middle lobe as well. We hoped to avoid a removal but with the amount of blood she was hemorrhaging, there was no choice but to take the upper lobe out. Hopefully we were able to salvage the middle lobe. We're going to watch that closely for any signs of further bleeding or infection at the moment."

"You might have to take that lobe out as well?" Bruce said.

"I would say the odds are 50/50 at this point. She's on a ventilator at the moment, and a pulmonologist and respiratory tech are working with her to try to minimize potential complications from that, but there was a lot of damage."

"But the lower lobe's fine. She should be alright as long as that's fine, right?" Jemma said.

"Hopefully, at least she might be if the lung was her only problem. The third bullet to the abdomen hit her liver and caused severe bleeding and structural damage. We lost her once when we were trying to bring that bleeding under control. We were able to revive her relatively quickly, so she hopefully won't suffer damage, at least from that, but we ended up having to resection and remove roughly a third of the liver before we could bring the bleeding completely under control."

"But you were able to control the bleeding?" Bruce asked.

"We hope so. Between packed red blood cells, plasma and platelets we've given her over fifty units of transfusion products. Her blood pressure is still very, very low but for the moment it's holding steady. We're hoping to maintain that, and avoid having to take her back to surgery if at all possible."

Over 50 units. Not good. "How are her coagulation panels?" Bruce said.

"Clotting time's increased, but not by as much as I was afraid it would be given the size of the transfusions she required. We're watching her now, and if it increases more, we have a couple of different options for bringing it under control."

"Okay, you took out part of her liver, and you took out part of her lung." Skye said. "But she can live without those, right? She can live with what's left and be okay?"

"Hopefully. Right now she's extremely critical. She's being moved to intensive care now and she's heavily sedated." Doctor Martin told them. "Honestly, if she survives the next twenty-four hours, I'll be very surprised. That level of trauma and that much blood loss…. That lady must be a fighter and a half to have made it this far. That's one thing she has going for her. Still, I hope the police are able to identify her and find her family soon. They need to be here."

"I'm sure her family will appreciate all you've done to take care of her." Pepper said. "I know we do and we're just the ones who found her. Thank you so much, Doctor."

"That bottle the raven brought, was that the potion your grandmother was talking about?" Jane said as soon as the doctor was gone. "The one she thought might help?"

Hela nodded. "If there's even a spark of life left, the potion should be enough to preserve that."

"Wait, potions?" Coulson said. "What are you talking about? Do you have something that could heal Victoria?"

"Healing's tricky, especially with mortals." Hela said. "But your agent is extremely strong, and fighting very hard. The potion my grandmother sent, if there's but a bit of life left, it can keep her alive, and allow her to heal on her own."

An alien potion. Coulson probably should have been leery of anything alien after his experience with GH-325, but…. "If you have something that might save Victoria, use it." At least if it worked, Victoria would be alive to kill him for allowing some alien substance to be used on her later, and the aliens who made the stuff would be handy should there be side effects.

"I would like to go if I can." Jemma said. An unknown substance, but after what the last unknown substance they had found had done for Skye, she felt more than a bit of hope that Agent Hand could be saved.

"And me." Skye said. She knew Coulson was blaming himself for what happened, for not picking up on the fact that Ward was Hydra, and now possibly an alien, but she felt plenty guilty too. He had been her SO. How could she have not noticed something?

Hela wrapped a notice me not spell around them, and the three silently moved through the intensive care unit while the others settled into the waiting room.

Victoria was in a room directly in front of the nurse's station. She was pale, paler than anything Skye or Jemma had ever seen before, the only signs of life, the faint movement of her chest where the ventilator pushed air into her lungs. IVs were in both arms, dripping blood and other fluids, and at the top of the hospital gown they could see the start of the bandages that ran down her body from collar bone to past her belly button. The chest tubes were still secured in her side, allowing any remaining fluid in her damaged lung to drain, and there were additional drains in her abdomen as well.

"What happened to her hair?" Skye asked. Those odd red streaks were gone and it looked like her hair was a couple of shades lighter.

"Illusion. I thought it best. Her hair was rather memorable before." Hela said.

"Illusion, that's good. I don't think she would be very happy if she had to find someone to fix her hair on short notice." Skye reached out and took Victoria's hand without thinking as she talked and started to stroke her fingers. She looked so small and broken. How could Ward have done this? How…. "Hey!" Skye's eyes went wide as she suddenly felt something, and looked down to see Victoria's little finger twitch slightly. "Agent Hand, ma'am, can you hear me?"

"They said they were going to sedate her. That has to be some sort of reflex." Jemma said. But then Victoria's finger twitched again. "Agent Hand?" Was it possible that she could hear them? Just out of surgery probably still under the effects of the anesthetic and whatever sedatives they had used, and she was somehow trying to respond to them? Surely that meant she had a chance!

I just lost my baby kitty this morning. He was a Victoria fan, and would sit with me while I was writing and urge me not to damage the poor woman too much. My current three stories are dedicated to him now. I love you so much, Pinky!


	14. Chapter 14

Voices. Victoria could hear voices talking above her, and then she felt someone taking her hand and gently stroking her fingers. Her eyelids wouldn't budge to let her see who was there, and when she tried to move her hand, all that she could even twitch was her little finger.

But apparently that was enough, because the voice called her name in response to the motion. The voice. She knew the voice. The hacker on Coulson's team? Was that who it was? Someone on Coulson's team, anyway, but not May. She was pretty sure it was the hacker. She willed her finger to move again, to let whichever one of Coulson's people was there know she could hear them. If Coulson's team was here, then the people who found her must have understood her message, but was it enough to save the Fridge? With only the use of one finger, how could she make them understand her, though?

"She can hear us. She's reacting to us. That's good, isn't it?" Skye said.

"That's excellent." And if Agent Hand was responding to them, that pretty much ended the fear that Jemma had left unvoiced since hearing about the amount of blood that she had lost, that she might have suffered hypoxic brain damage due to a lack of red blood cells to carry oxygen to her brain. "Ma'am, it's Agent Simmons, and Skye from Agent Coulson's team. You're in the hospital, ma'am. You just had surgery. You're going to be fine."

Coulson's team. She was right about the voices, but how could she let them know that she needed an update on what was going on? Had the Fridge held? If they lost that, if those prisoners escaped, they were in serious trouble. How to make them understand? She could feel the tube in her throat, preventing speech and she could barely move one finger. In frustration, she started tapping lightly against the hand holding hers. Six taps, a pause and then six more.

"What?" Six taps. What did that… Wait. letters of the alphabet. She counted letters quickly in her head. F. "The Fridge? Are you wanting to know what happened at the Fridge, ma'am?" Skye said. "The Fridge is fine."

"My uncle Thor and my grandparents were happy to alert the agents, and assist in the defense against Hydra." Hela said. "Uncle Thor called just a bit ago to let us know that the defense was a complete success and that the Hydra prisoners are being moved back to Asgard to be held until other arrangements can be made for them. I'm Lady Hela, Ma'am. My older brothers were the ones who found you. They're very glad to know that you're alright."

Hela, Thor. Had what she had thought she had hallucinated in the swamp, a giant snake and a huge wolf, had those been real? Loki actually had a wolf and a snake for sons? A foggy part of her mind wondered if that meant the story about his eight legged horse son was correct as well. Maybe Loki had a few reasons to be cranky if it was? And other things were drifting back to her. Banner. She had heard the name Banner, she was sure, and where he went, Stark could usually be found as well. Avengers? Avengers were good. They had saved the world from aliens. Surely they could figure out how to handle Hydra. And Coulson would be happy to work with them. Why Fury had never told them he was alive, she didn't understand that at all.

"My grandmother has potions that can identify any Hydra agents that might remain, and clear the other innocent agents of suspicion." Hela said. "I wish we had known about the problem sooner. Maybe we could have done something to prevent this." But at least they knew now and could hopefully help. "We have something that should help you feel better."

"Is there any chance it could be injected?" Jemma asked. With the tube in her throat so the machines could breathe for her, getting her to swallow whatever the potion was would be impossible. But if it could keep Agent Hand alive, they needed to give it to her as soon as possible.

"I'm not sure." Hela said.

"Wait. Can't some medicines go under the tongue? Could it work that way?" Skye said. "She can't swallow, but could it maybe help at least a little if we could get it in her mouth?"

"Could that work?" Jemma asked.

"It might be enough, yes." Hela said. "Grandmother said that a few drops would be enough if there was but a spark of life left."

"And she's got way more than a spark of life." Skye said. "Is that some sort of Shield thing, trying to get back to work before the anesthetic from surgery even wears off, because if it is, you probably need to know that Agent Blake is slacking off. He was demanding to be feed coffee through a straw, and wasn't even thinking about working. You probably should have a talk with him. This is going to help you, we promise."

Jemma was worried that even a small amount of liquid might cause Agent Hand to gag, and she sighed softly when there wasn't a problem after Hela pressed the small bottle to her lips and let several drops of the blue liquid inside slip into her mouth.

"How can you tell if it's working?" Skye asked.

"Her blood pressure's coming up a bit." Jemma said after a moment. It was still dangerously low, barely 70 over 50 but the numbers had edged up slightly. "It's doing something." And maybe even a little bit would be enough.

"It's going to be okay." Skye told her. "It's helping. You're going to be okay. Is there anyone that AC needs to call for you?" Sneaking more people in would probably be tricky if they wanted to keep Agent Hand's whereabouts a secret, but if she had family they would want to be here.

Calling someone. Victoria had long ago made the decision if she was ever severely injured not to have her family notified. She had made the decision to join Shield, knowing that death in the line of duty was always a possibility. She wouldn't put her family through torment as a result of her decision to take on a dangerous job. If she was injured, she could call them herself later if she recovered, or if the worst happened, Fury or Hill could break the bad news to them. Surely that would be better than weeks of worry and torment at her bedside. And with the situation with Hydra, she wanted her family as far away from her as possible, to keep them safe. Her finger twitched twice, and she hoped that Coulson's hacker would realize she meant no.

"Okay." There wasn't anyone Agent Hand wanted with her? That was… "Do you think I could stay? Could you do a spell or something so no one would notice me, so I could stay with her, at least for a little while?" Skye asked. Leaving Agent Hand alone, when she was so badly hurt, it just seemed cruel.

"I can do that, yes." Hela said, smiling slightly at the young agent's compassion. On Asgard, it was traditional for a watch to be set for the dead, to show them honor. Surely it was only fitting that someone who had fought so hard, and had done her duty even on the edge of death, shouldn't be left to fight alone.

"We'll be back in a bit. I'm sure Agent Coulson is going to want to check on her." Jemma said as Hela cast another spell, and then the two left, leaving Skye to settle into a chair at Agent Hand's bedside.

"Okay, I'm probably really not who you want hanging around now, but I'm going to stay right here, I promise. You're safe here. Hydra isn't going to find you, and Shield's at least safer because of what you did. They probably ought to give you some sort of award when you're feeling better and if we can find whoever's supposed to be in charge of handing out things like that. Bleeding to death and you were still trying to do your job? That's seriously, seriously, well, I don't know what to call it, but that had to take a ton of strength to do that. If you're that tough, you're going to make it through this. You're going to be okay."


	15. Chapter 15

"Jemma?" Coulson looked up as Jemma appeared almost out of nowhere, stepping through the illusion that Hela had cast to give them privacy in the ICU waiting room. "Where's Skye?" He felt a moment of panic, even though they were in a hospital where no one knew them, in an ICU with limited access. After what they had just been through, if he could he would put his entire team on leashes, to keep them within a couple of feet of him at all times.

"She wanted to sit with Agent Hand for a bit." Jemma told him. "She didn't want to leave her alone. She…. She responded to us. She heard us talking to her, and she was able to respond."

"She responded to you?" May said before Coulson could react. With the degree of trauma Victoria had suffered, with the amount of blood she had lost, Melinda had honestly been surprised that the doctor hadn't brought up the specter of Victoria having suffered brain damage as a result of what had happened. But then, the doctor didn't seem to expect her to survive twenty-four hours, so why would he talk about something that would never become a problem to be dealt with?

"She's very, very weak, and I'm sure the anesthetic and the sedatives are having a strong effect on her, but she heard us, she felt Skye holding her hand. she responded to us." Jemma said with a smile.

"She seemed oriented?" Bruce asked. "How was she responding?"

"I know it sounds crazy, but she was able to twitch her little finger, and at first I thought it might be a reflex, but she did it when Skye asked if she could hear us, and then she was tapping out a definite pattern, six taps, a pause and then six more."

"Six?" Coulson was confused for a moment before it hit him. Letters. She had been trying to signal a letter. "She wanted to know about the Fridge. She wanted to make sure that we knew that Ward and Garrett were going to attack the Fridge." And for the first time since this disaster started, hope came rushing back. Victoria, suffering the injuries she had suffered, was somehow still fighting to save Shield. She had fought to save Shield even on the brink of death. The Asgardians had stepped in to help them. Stark and his people had stepped in to help them. Loki's kids were helping them. Hydra had infiltrated Shield, Fury was… Well, he was supposed to be dead, but he wasn't going to place money on that. But suddenly for every bad thing, Coulson was seeing two good things to counter it. He didn't know precisely how, yet, but they were going to fix this.

"Should she be doing that?" Fitz asked. "I mean, it's great that she knows who the two of you are, and can react and everything, but should she be doing anything besides sleeping and trying to get better?"

"She needs rest, and I would be careful not to stimulate her too much right now, but if she's trying to communicate, I would encourage it if you can at all. The amount of trauma she suffered, she's going to have a long road to recovery, and it's really easy for someone to get disoriented and depressed when they're confined to intensive care for an extended period." Bruce said. "She's going to need people with her, and a certain level of interaction to prevent that."

Coulson nodded. If it would help Victoria, he would let her try her hand at running Shield from her hospital bed, and he wouldn't be surprised if she were willing to give it a shot. And probably do it better than him and Fury combined. Which was making him feel extremely foolish for ever thinking Victoria could be Hydra. She wouldn't need some Nazi group to take over. She could manage that fine on her own, if she ever decided to try, and at least it would be a bloodless coupe. Thanks to some rather poor math skills she could probably have half of the senior agents drug away for income tax irregularities and be in charge by lunchtime. "Physically, how is she?"

"Very, very weak. I don't think that she even had the strength to try to open her eyes. Her blood pressure and heartrate are very low, but they're holding steady, and after we gave her the potion Hela offered, they did seem to go up a tiny bit. It's not going to be like Skye's recovery, but she's fighting, and I honestly think that she's got a good chance of pulling through this." With how hard Agent Hand was fighting, she wouldn't let herself believe that her chafes of coming through this were anything but good. Someone trying that hard, they deserved nothing but positive thoughts being sent their way and encouragement that they were going to be fine.

"Okay, do you mind walking me back there to give her an update?" Coulson asked Hela. "And after that, we need to get to work, to pull together what we can of Shield. We've got a lot of good agents out there without backup that need our help.

As Coulson and Hela left, with Fenrir padding along behind them for some reason, Fitz spoke. "One finger. That seems like a frustrating way to try to communicate, only being able to use one finger. How would she be able to answer anything besides yes or no questions without exhausting herself tapping out letters one at a time." He turned to Stark. "What about some sort of keyboard?"

"It would have to be small." Stark said, eyes glittering. "Keys would need to be easy to press, but not so easy that you would be constantly hitting the wrong one." Coming up with something that might work would be a challenge, but he was sure he was up for it. "I'll bet they have parts somewhere around here that we can use. Or I can call and have something couriered over." And before anyone could say anything, Stark had swooped up Fitz and Banner and they were headed for the elevator, with Tripplett following behind them.

"What just happened?" May demanded. She had never seen someone move that fast before. Weren't Stark's abilities in his suit?

"Give him something to build, and you won't believe how fast Tony can be. I just wish he would show a little of that speed when it comes time to show up for board meetings." Pepper said as she pulled out her phone and dialed. "Tony, whatever you are doing, remember we aren't on a first name basis with the bomb squad here, and Phile would like his people back in one piece!"


	16. Chapter 16

Skye was still holding Victoria's hand and talking to her when Coulson, Hela and her brother slipped into the room. "One other piece of good news from the Fridge. Ward's dead. Apparently he actually had an idea that he could take on an Asgardian, which you would think he would have a clue wasn't going to end well for him. Him being near anything from Asgard never does. Thor's mom ran him through, and then he fell of the roof of the building, and ended up splattered on the ground. He's never going to hurt anyone else again." Should she tell her about Ward being an alien? But no, the idea that the planet might have been invaded again was probably the last thing Agent Hand needed to hear right now. Bad enough that Shield had been infiltrated by Hydra without adding aliens to the mix. "You're safe here. No one's going to hurt you again, I promise."

Coulson winced at the sight of Victoria in that hospital bed. Less than twenty-four hours ago, had it been really less than twenty-four hours ago when she had tried to kill his team and had managed to hold the Hub against all odds for Shield? To see her in this condition, small and broken, not even able to breathe on her own… "Victoria?" He called her name as Hela let the illusion drop. Despite what Jemma had said, he didn't see a way that Victoria could be in any condition to respond to them, not with that much damage done to her body.

Coulson. His team was here, of course Coulson would be here too. But if he was here, come to hover at her bedside, who was running Shield? And the Hub, she had left Coulson to look after her base! If she found out that he had abandoned the place she had fought so hard to hold, so he could pay a hospital visit….

"AC, here." Skye stood and took his arm, and pulled him over, into the chair she had just vacated. Even just being able to twitch one finger, it was obvious that Agent Hand was getting agitated. Hopefully she would calm down if Coulson could give her an update and convince her that Shield was holding together while she was sick in bed. "Just hold her hand and talk to her. I think she was getting a little sleepy, but I'll bet she'll want to hear from you before she goes to sleep."

"Victoria?" Coulson took her hand, not sure what to expect, but then there it was, her little finger twitching lightly against his hand and suddenly the hope that had started to fade upon seeing how serious her injuries were was back and growing.

What had happened to her base? Even though she had a bad feeling that breathing on her own would be impossible at the moment, she cursed the tube in her throat making speech impossible. She tapped against his hand, eight taps, a pause and then eight more, hoping he would understand what she needed to know.

Eight…. And then he remembered what Jemma had said, about how Victoria had tried to ask for information on the Fridge, to make sure her message warning them about Ward and Garrett had gotten through. "Everyone at the Hub is safe." He told her. "We had a problem with Glenn Talbot showing up with a peacekeeping force so we had to enact the Odyssey protocols. Everyone who was on their feet is either in hiding, or at Stark's company for safety. Stark offered to look after the injured from medical. Everything's fine."

Talbot. Glenn Talbot had taken over her base? Didn't Coulson know how much disinfecting would be required after Talbot had been on the loose in her building? He would probably go into her office, put his feet on her desk and sit in her nice comfy chair just for spite. She would have to burn everything!

"It's alright." Hela said. "Lord Volstagg's daughter Hildy was able to activate a shielding spell to protect your base. No one will be able to enter until the spell is removed. Pepper expressed some concern that anyone the building might be turned over to could be an agent of Hydra, and then Betty expressed some concern that this Talbot person's choice of facial hair could be an indication of Nazi tendencies and not an unfortunate style choice, so it seemed safest to seal the building. You can rest easy on that."

Nazi. Now that she thought about it, Talbot did have that Nazi look about him. Okay, the Hub was secure, her people were safe, and Coulson apparently had some idea about trying to run Shield from a hospital. At least no one would expect Shield to be operating out of a hospital, though, which was a good thing. There were other things that needed to be done, though. What about agents who had been in the field when things fell apart? And the bases that they had lost to Hydra, there had to be a way to retake those. Africa, if they allowed that to remain in Hydra hands, they were sure to use it as a staging ground to take Wakanda and vibranium. The other agents first, though. They needed every loyal agent they could get if Shield was going to survive. She was tired, so tired, but she made her finger twitch again. One tap, a pause, seven taps, another pause, five taps and then she struggled trying to tap out fourteen without a break between.

"Agents? The agents at the Hub are fine." Coulson reassured her again, but there was more more motion. Six taps, pause, nine taps, pause, five taps. "Field? The agents who were in the field." He hadn't even thought about the agents who were out in the field. And with all of Shield's secrets out on the internet, those people were in serious danger. What had the people who put that information out there been thinking? There was a difference between outing Hydra and outing innocent people who were undercover risking their lives to protect the world. "We'll find the field agents." Hopefully most of them had plans for going off the grid if they were compromised, but still, this could be a major disaster.

If she was at the Hub, she could help, but…. Victoria was tired, but thankfully not the feeling that she recalled from the swamp, a tiredness resulting from the life draining from her. But she could give Coulson one thing maybe. two taps, pause, one tap.

"Barton? Do you know where he is?"

A tap he assumed meant yes and then five taps on a row. "Europe." Another single tap for yes, and then nine more. "Italy." Not much, but with Stark's resources and Skye, hopefully enough to find Clint. "Thank you." He told Victoria. "And I owe you such a big apology it would probably take me the rest of the day to deliver it. You were right, something is wrong with me. I'm not Hydra but some of my decisions have been so compromised I can see how you could think I was." What had Fury been thinking, letting him out in the field? "I'm so sorry, Victoria. This shouldn't have happened. We're going to fix this, I promise you. Right now you need to rest. Shield needs you to get better, alright? I'm going to keep one of my people in here with you to be safe."

"And Fenir would like to say it that's alright." Hela added as the wolf padded over to the bed, opening his mouth wide to show off sharp teeth before taking up a defensive position at the foot of Victoria's bed. "He's a protector of great skill. You will be safe here, you have his word on that."

"You're safe. You're going to be fine." Coulson squeezed Victoria's hand. "Just rest now, and try to get some of your strength back. Shield needs you to get well. You saved the Fridge, you saved thousands of people. You're giving our agents who were trapped in the field a chance. Rest now and get your strength back." He gently touched her forehead, and brushed strands of hair back. "What you have up there, it's what we need right now. Just rest and try to get some strength back so you'll be able to share all of that with us, alright, because if anything is going to save Shield, it's going to be that."


End file.
